Connoisseurs' Guide to California Wine

Tuesday Tributes
Chenin Blanc vs Riesling—And Other Random Thoughts

Tue, 15 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Hello to all you mothers out there who make your day into such a fine wine day. If there is ever a day when an aromatic white is in order, it is a sunny, breezy Sunday afternoon when we get together with several generations of mothers in several venues from brunch to dinner with a stop in between. And truth be told, we did enjoy a fair number of well-chosen whites on the day.

I must admit my bias upfront for Riesling as the bright and easy to like white of choice for this special day. But, having come back from the Loire Valley just a week ago, I also took along a few choice Chenin Blancs—of the dry persuasion mostly, and kind of had my own personal taste-off.

The Rieslings still lead the pack for me if I have to choose one variety. Nothing wrong with a good, off-dry Vouvray, but frankly, Riesling does off-dry a little better. On the other hand, the bone-dry Rieslings left me cold (no pun intended). Crisp they were, but less than pretty and a touch green and angular for their sins. The dry Chenins seem to wear their brightness and acidity a little better and to hang onto their aromatic sides more clearly. Took along a couple of fairly sweet wines, and here I will admit to a bit of a surprise. Loved the Riesling, but found a sturdier glory in the sweet, grapefruity, pineapply, ripe pear flavors of the sweet Vouvray.

I am tempted to declare a draw here, but that is really not fair. Each variety has its own unique charms, and while I have been remiss in not paying enough attention to well-made Chenins, I have to side with Chenin as the star of the day if only because it was like a visit with an old and long-lost friend.

Random Thoughts
--The auction firm, Sotheby’s, has commissioned its own house Champagne which it will sell not just to the “swells” attending its auctions of the good and the fancy, but will offer online as well to all comers. Now, I get why restaurants and grocery stores may want their own privately branded merchandise, but an auction house going into the wine business seems a bit of a stretch. What’s next? Bentley and Rolls Royce dealers? Tiffany’s?

--Decanter Magazine, my choice for the top slick paper wine magazine in existence, is in the midst of running a poll for its readers about the so-called “natural wines”. In its own little bit of irony, Decanter wants to know if wine labels, including those who would brand themselves as “natural”, should disclose what is really in the wine. It has created a poll for its readers that includes the following choice: “(b) No, it’s just a bunch of hippies spouting health and safety rubbish”.

--From the “I could not make this up if I tried” file comes this press release for a new winery in the Napa Valley:

“Frenchie Winery, named for and inspired by Raymond Vineyards Proprietor Jean-Charles Boisset's French bulldog, debuted on May 9. "Frenchie was a gift to my beloved wife," Boisset said, "to ensure that she would always be in the company of a French gentleman."

“Frenchie Winery wants to ensure that canines are well taken care. Frenchie Winery is the only tasting room in the world designed exclusively for dogs, including a special dog-friendly tasting bar”.

I wonder why Connoisseurs’ Guide was not invited to the Grand Opening. We could have borrowed my daughter’ dog, Cody Ross, a Springer Spaniel named for the baseball player, for the event. Now that his namesake is no longer with the San Francisco Giants, Cody the dog is no longer in demand on game days in these parts.

Meet the New CGCW

For thirty-five years, Connoisseurs’ Guide has been the authoritative voice of the California wine consumer. With readers in all fifty states and twenty foreign countries, the Guide is valued by wine lovers everywhere for its honesty and for it strong adherence to the principles of transparency, unbiased, hard-hitting opinions. Now, it is becoming the California winelover’s most powerful online voice as well. And, our new features provide an unmatched array of advice and information for aficionados of every stripe.

Friday Fishwrap
Santa Rita Hills Pinot Noir: “More Is More” or “Less Is More”. A Debate.

Fri, 11 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It is more than a little fascinating to see the difference in winemakers’ perspectives and conclusions when viewing the same picture. A couple of winemaker interviews by Blake Gray over the last couple of weeks caught my eye, and they reveal two different and intriguing views about preferred style and winemaker rationale doing what they do. A peripatetic pair of Pinot Noir winemakers, Adam Lee of Siduri and Sashi Moorman of Evening Land, Sandhi, Peidrassa and Stolpmann spoke, and Pinot Noir was the topic.

Now, Mr. Moorman has a very clear idea what he wants in a wine and definitively talks of complexity that is apparently only born of lower ripeness and less alcohol. He very curiously seems to find complexity and what he calls “deliciousness” as somewhat antithetical. He likens grapes to peaches and strawberries and argues that extra ripeness will make them more delicious but that the loss of certain “unripe elements” leaves the grapes and the resultant wine from which they are made less interesting. He is also very clearly far from being a fan of those “financially successful” producers who go for power and ripeness and, I presume, deliciousness, and he states rather matter of factly in his championing of the Santa Rita Hills as a unique enclave for elegant Pinot that “you can make opulent wines anywhere”. I confess to very much liking some of Sashi’s Pinots, most notably his 2009s under the Evening Land label, and to me they are delicious and not in the least green. I have also from time to time enjoyed the very rich wines of Sea Smoke, that very same financially successful estate that Moorman does not revere.

Adam Lee, on the other hand, is far more circumspect in his opinions about style. He may or may not have a preference for just how Pinot should taste, but he declines to state it and instead believes that it is ultimately up to the grapes to dictate style as opposed to the winemaker’s hand. He offers up the rather startling observation that he is less concerned with adhering to a fixed stylistic model than he was in the past and that allowing a vineyard to express itself in any given vintage is now his aim. Ripeness and/or alcohol are not inherently good or bad, the health and balance of the grape is the key. When queried about the Santa Rita Hills, he lacked Mr. Moormon’s unquestioning evangelism and warned of difficult tannins in grapes that were less than fully ripe. Given the success of the brilliant 2009 Siduri Pinot from the Clos Pepe Vineyard, Adam apparently knows something about the appellation as well.

Now it may be that the Santa Rita Hills has enough varying circumstance as to defy the notion of any singular style as best, and it may simply be that there is the potential for a good many successful variations on the Pinot Noir theme. Is the potential for Santa Rita Hills Pinot entirely dependent on lower alcohol wines? Are those that achieve higher ripeness and deliciousness failures? Can “delicious” and “complex” as defined by Moorman find peaceful coexistence in the same place. These are questions being asked in a good many of California’s fine wine regions these days. I, for one, am tired of bi-polar conflict and am ready for detente between the more-is-more and less-is-more crowds.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Blog

Thu, 10 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Doctor Strangepalate

I once thought that social media was a hoax. Then I learned how to get my own Twitter account, to set up not one but two Facebook sites and somehow got roped into LinkedIn. Oh, and along the way, I established this blog.

Truth be told, I did not believe in any of it. Not even after seeing the Facebook movie set in Cambridge, the very town where I grew up, hung out, learned to drink, somehow managed to sneak into the local college and then fled from that esteemed locale for what was supposed to be a two-year gig on the left coast—from which I have not yet returned after all these years.

It was a dark and stormy day in San Francisco when I was challenged by some young, hip kid to discover social media. Get thyself online and set yourself free. Think of all the friends you will make. Think of all the new readers you will find. Think about emerging from the old media that has held you captive for three decades and breathe the fresh air of the Internet 2.0.

Okay, you hip kid, I have done it. So why does my knee ache from a half hour of softball with the grandkids and Twitter make me feel like I am cheating when I condense complex thoughts into 140 characters? Don’t get me wrong. I like Twitter. I wrote hundreds of tweets to be read by hundreds, no make that thousands of fellow twits. But it was all so incomplete. I get a string of inane thirty-word comments every day, and, between you, me and the hard drive, barely a handful have any meaning.

Oh sure, mine are different. Whole blogs topics condensed into the equivalent of a Ritz cracker. Pleadings for folks to come read my writings. Impossible discussions with folks who are not listening and get angry if their thirty-word summaries are contradicted by my thirty-word summaries. I like Twitter. But it suffers from what Yogi Berra once said of a very popular restaurant in New York City, “It has become so popular, nobody goes there anymore”. Or to put it more succinctly, despite the constant barrage of words and the presence of many good and thoughtful people on Twitter, I don’t go there anymore.

I do understand. My kids love social media. Why call when a text will do? Let’s tell the whole world about everything going on in their lives on their Facebook pages. Really, I do understand. I am too old to be hip. I keep getting reminded of that fact when I see, or worse yet, attend concerts by singers I liked decades ago. It is not that they have no hair or are paunchy. They can’t sing anymore. The music is the same, the words are the same. Their voices are no longer hip. I’m not sure I was ever hip. I know I am not now.

But, there is one part of social media that I love—and that is this blog. It turns out that Mr. Old Folks has a lot to say, has lots of opinions to share and just loves having a place to share them. Writing is work, and writing a blog is no different from any other kind of writing if one wants to be smart, cogent, grammatical and all those other things that good writing should be. I like to think that the CGCW blog, whatever else it may be, and Lord knows that it has not become nearly so popular as the blogs of folks like Steve Heimoff, Alder Yarrow and so many others in the wine arena, is “smart” most of the time.

Steve Eliot and I think about the issues confronting the wine industry. We challenge ourselves and the people about whom we write, both positively and negatively, to think. No one has to agree. They only need to think.

I worried about social media. Now, I love it. I love ignoring my Facebook page and Twitter and I love the blog. Hurray for social media. It is so popular that no one goes there anymore. But here we all are—at least until the next big thing comes along.

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
“You Taste Through Your Toes”

Wed, 09 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Someone must have said it first, but Google refuses tell me who. Whoever it was, I want to meet him and shake his hand. This wonderful insult, “You taste through your toes”, is hurled around our tastings as often as one of us needs taking down a peg. It is the ultimate insult among friends because it is both joke and dig at the same time. In our business, it helps to be able to do both.

I was tempted to dump this phrase into the conversations of wine tasting that have shown up recently in the blogs of Blake Gray over at The Gray Market Report (http://blog.wblakegray.com/) and Mike Dunne’s A Year In Wine (http://www.ayearinwine.com/). Both of these guys are seasoned professionals. They know their ways around, and if you have been paying attention to this blog, you have seen both post comments here in their efforts to keep us on the right path as they see it. And you will find my comments over on their blogs from time to time.

Both Blake and Mike were addressing the issue of differences of opinion in one judging and why it happens. They came at the topic from very different vantage points and were not necessarily trying to define the all reasons so much as exploring a couple of useful ideas.

Mike Dunne wondered about staying sober in the grueling, all day tastings that wine critics will sometimes allow themselves to get roped into. He mentioned that he can get through such events in relatively sober fashion but has seen judges who get “blotto”—to use his word. We see that same situation on rare occasion at Connoisseurs’ Guide’s tastings which are limited to just sixteen wines spread over three hours.

Some people think they are spitting out the wine, when, in fact, they are not. I would never accuse those folks of being too fond of the product, but the facts are that most of our tasters end the event with a fair accumulation of expectorated liquids in their expectorate collectors (known in the trade as “spit buckets”). Those who do not expectorate sufficiently wind up with far less liquid in the collectors and far too much liquid in themselves. Hence, the blotto factor.

A wine judge pretty much has two choices—spit it out or get pie-eyed (another term for blotto). And frankly, any wine taster who gets pie-eyed, blotto, stinko, plastered, hammered, tight or polluted is in the wrong business. Let’s leave it at that and wander over to Blake Gray’s world.

Blake is just back from Portugal where he chaired one of several panels at the Concours Mondial, Europe’s largest wine judging. Mr. Gray was wondering aloud about the difference in judging results between three and five member panels.

That is a fair question, and one that we wrestled with here at Connoisseurs’ Guide in our early years. At the outset, we tried to create tasting panels of eight to twelve people. We brought in learned tasters from all parts of the industry and had them taste wines blind and then discuss the results. We learned a lot, but what we also learned was that a smaller number of qualified professionals came up with the same results as our very large panels. We finally settled on five as the number of choice—not because it was magical but because it worked well.

But what we settled on that was even more important was the notion of knowledgeable tasters. The bottom line for us soon became the absolute demand that the tasters possess a body of knowledge of sufficient depth and range such that they could talk to each other. No such group of tasters agrees with each other all the time, but when the tasters come equipped with sufficient knowledge, good conclusions are possible most of the time. If they are not for a particular wine, we put the wine back into another tasting.

Blake Gray relates that his panel at the Concours Mondial gave no Gold Medals because it could not talk to each other. It was not that they all spoke different native languages. It was that they did not speak the same wine language. Blake did not offer that sentiment aloud, and I admit that I am adding my own interpretation based on my own experiences. I have tasted in such panels on four continents and with tasters from Australia, Argentina, Canada, England, France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa and Spain. With few exceptions, we all spoke the same wine language and rarely had massive disagreements. It happens occasionally that a wine judge will simply not find common ground with the rest of the panel, and usually it is because that person was less well-schooled in wine than the assignment merited. Not their fault. They simply responded to an invitation. It happens at our tastings from time to time as well.

But, we rarely have the kinds of difficulties that Blake Gray experienced in his panel. Qualified wine judges find their ways to the “truth” because their palates know how to do it.

I no longer participate on those kinds of all day, several days back to back panels if I can help it, in part for the issues that both Mike and Blake have surfaced, but mostly because wine tasting for hours on end becomes grueling and takes the fun out being there for me. But, I respect people like Blake and Mike who do make themselves available to such events. They raise the level of professionalism and make good results possible. But only if they are joined by other professionals who also share a common tasting perspective and do not taste through their toes.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Salmon: A Fish for All Wines

Tue, 08 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Is there a protein that is more generous in its ability to mate with a wide variety of wine? Maybe, but not many.

The hot topic in the local culinary world hereabouts is Salmon. The Northern California commercial season opened last week, and after several years of closures due to dwindling numbers and disappointingly scarce harvests, 2012 is shaping up as the best catch in years.

Among San Francisco Bay Area gourmands, the excitement is downright palpable, and I admit to getting a little excited myself. I simply never get tired of the stuff, and, despite being able to find outstanding farmed Salmon such as Framgord’s and Black Pearl from the Shetland Islands and Verlasso from Chile’s Patagonian Coast, I must cast my vote for fresh, local, wild-caught King Salmon as the best of them all.

Salmon has always struck me as both a phenomenally versatile ingredient when it comes to cooking method and extraordinarily wine-friendly regardless of how it is prepared. It can be sautéed and poached, roasted and grilled. It can be a revelation when simply smoked, it can be delicious when served raw, and its inherent richness invites service with a host of flavorful sauces.

It is not at all uncommon at Chez Eliot, for the evening meal to be inspired first by the wine, and, with the exception of the heaviest reds such as Syrah, Petite Sirah, late-harvest Zinfandel and highly extracted, heavily oaked Cabernet Sauvignons, it is not at all hard to find a fine vinous match to any of Salmon’s so many variations.

A sleek and lively Sauvignon Blanc plays a fine foil to simply sautéed fillets that are brightened with a squeeze of lemon, while recipes where Salmon comes napped in richer sauces show off flavorful Chardonnays at their best. Well-seasoned grilled Salmon steaks usually leave me waffling between those same Chardonnays and a firmly built Pinot Noir when it comes time to choose. The case has been made, and I agree, that fruity, well-balanced Zinfandel is a surprisingly affable partner, and, finally, I confess a real fondness for a glass or two of good sparkling wine with most any Salmon preparation, a Brut Rosé such as that from Roederer Estate or Schramsberg being right at the top of my list.

A quick search on Google will yield an absolute treasure trove of marvelous recipes and specific wine-pairing recommendations, but when Salmon is on the menu, know that but for high-tannin bruisers or syrupy sweets, bad wine matches are rare, and the options are endless. Sad to say, the local Salmon season, however, is not, and there is no time like the present to enjoy two of Northern California’s greatest gifts.

Addendum from Charles Olken: Two of my most enjoyable salmon and wine pairings would seem to defy Steve’s suggestions, and certainly surprised me. The first came on a trip to France, at lunch with the Comte Lur-Saluce, owner of Chateau d’Yquem (please pardon the name-dropping). We had two courses, the second being that uniquely French combination of foie gras and his own wine. But it was the first, a piece of poached salmon in a cream sauce served with a Doisy Daene Sauterne that added a new wine and food combo to the Olken household repertoire of fancy dishes.

And, some years later, on a command visit to the Cuvaison winery up in the Napa Valley, the managing editor, who summoned me to discuss to how to make CGCW into a better publication (more maps was his prescription), I was served a jerk-seasoned salmon filet sautéed in butter and accompanied by the winery’s surprising rich and accessible Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve.

That is why, if I were isolated on a desert island with only one protein, it would be salmon.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Read On For Chardonnays That Please The Palate and The Wallet

Fri, 04 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Hey, it is oaky to like Chardonnay. (Bad pun intended).

California Chardonnay has suffered more than its fair share of attacks from the parroting “Anything but Chardonnay” crowd, and there are those who dismiss it with derisive snorts and sententiously call it “silly”. Funny thing though, it continues to command consumer attention at all price points in the market and remains the best selling white wine of them all. Ah, but what does the consumer know?

Sure, Chardonnay has become a commodity wine, and I would in no way extol the virtues of the cheap, mass-market bottlings that sell for a few dollars, but I am baffled at the persistence of the mind-numbing mantra of “too ripe, too oaky and too alcoholic.” Sometimes I wonder if Chardonnay’s too-many detractors actually taste much of the stuff.

We taste a lot, some thousand or so annually I’d guess, and, while not every example is a charmer, there is a wealth of remarkably good offerings made in a good many styles to be had. Yes, it is okay to like Chardonnay, and we do.

The last several vintages, 2009, 2010 and 2011, have been cool and quirky years hereabouts, and there is a seeming trend of late for local Chardonnays to be made in lighter and livelier versions. Whether due to stylistic intent or more simply the result of capable winemakers paying attention to what nature provides, the cause and dimensions of said trend are very much open to debate. It will be interesting to see if the sun returns in full force this coming Summer and Fall.

The simple truth, regardless of vintage, is that richness and balance are not antithetical, and our quintet of recent favorites from 2010 is proof enough of the fact.

J WINE COMPANY Russian River Valley 2010 $28.00 If the so-called "new paradigm" dictates acid instead of fruit and minerality instead of oak, this wine somehow manages to have feet in both camps and comes out very nicely made because it delivers at every level. Its early aromatic reserve leads to a second look that finds precise fruit sitting confidently in solid support of stony, spicy, chalky notes, and, on the palate, as the wine sits in your mouth, its full array of complex, deep and still nascent pieces becomes undeniably compelling. Despite its ability to charm now, it will grow for another year or two in bottle and will bring all of its parts into fuller view. Do lay a few bottles away.

SCOTT FAMILY Dijon Clone Arroyo Seco 2010 $25.00 This exceptionally well-made wine exhibits keen Chardonnay focus with excellent balance and depth rarely seen at the price. It is at once both substantial and vital with tremendous staying power on the palate, and its layered flavors build and build as they go. Its generous measure of sweet oak never threatens to overtake its incisive, long-lasting fruit, and it ranks among the very best Chardonnay values in today's marketplace.

McINTYRE Estate Santa Lucia Highlands 2010 $28.00 Complexing elements of roasted grains and buttered toast are attention-getting adjuncts to lots of concentrated, youthfully pert, apple-like fruit in the nose, and the wine follows suit on the palate with very vital young flavors that, while tasty, are still slightly tight and filled with potential. Ripeness is met by fine, firming acids, and the wine is as bright as it is rich, and it has all the right parts in place to impress even more as it unfolds over the next several years.

DAVIS BYNUM Russian River Valley 2010 $25.00 Without question the best Chardonnay to ever appear under this label, this one gets it right in terms of its keen fruity focus, its fine sense of balance and its oak and mineral extras, and all of its pieces are seamlessly fit. It is, withal, a complete package that manages to be both lively and fairly generous at the same time, and, while it should keep comfortably for several years, it is delicious right now. Its combination of quality and price are exemplary and earn it an added measure of attention.

VALLEY OF THE MOON Sonoma Coast 2010 $16.00 Straightforward fruit is the main theme of this nicely balanced middleweight, and, if never a Chardonnay of extravagance or head-turning depth, it is solidly on the varietal track. It exhibits elements of fresh apples, citrus and stones with a light overlay of sweet oak, and its finish is punctuated with a touch of lime. It will keep well for several years, but it is ready to go now.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
It Is Time for Wine Lists to Serve Me—Not the Sommelier’s Ego

Thu, 03 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Say what you will about wine lists. If they are not balanced and fairly priced, I am not interested.

What is the best wine grape? Cabernet Sauvignon or Pinot Noir? Chardonnay or Riesling? Maybe Nebbiolo or, perhaps, Zinfandel? I expect that most any serious wine lover would, of course, scoff at the idea that one grape might stand out as superior to all others, so I am a little surprised at the increasing buzz lately that there might be a “best” format for restaurant wine lists.

Putting together a successful restaurant wine list is no easy thing. It takes knowledge of wine, a good culinary sense, a mind for business, a good dose of humility and the ability to really listen to what customers want. There has been a good deal of journalistic chatter on the topic of late, and there are as many opinions as to what a good wine list entails as there are bottles to chose from. And, as always, there seems an abiding need to be new and different.

The big story these days is “downsizing”. Wine lists, we are told, are too long and confusing, that it is simply impossible for the average wine drinker to comprehend a lengthy list. While I would not argue with the notion that there is an enormous amount of very good wine emanating from all over the world, I wonder if this new preoccupation with abridgement is not the result of recessionary economics rather than some sudden insight that was missed by sommeliers and restaurateurs for generations past. It may make good business sense for this or that restaurant, but please quit telling me it is for my own good.

Another complaint is that the usual organization of wine lists is archaic and inadequate to meet the needs and realities of the 21st century consumer. There are those such as the Wine Spectator’s Matt Kramer who argue that categorization by region or varietal or accepted definitions of style are no longer useful. While I do question the helpfulness of Matt’s suggestions that a wine list might be improved if arranged by elevation, vine age, climate or yield, I confess that neither specific organization nor number is my first concern when considering a new list. Categorize as you will, and I, the customer, will decide what works and what does not.

What I look for first from a good list is a balanced selection of wines that drink well with the restaurant’s menu. By balanced, I mean a good mix of well-known wines and those that might be regarded as esoteric. Some nights I am ready for adventure, and on some I would prefer the comfort of a trusted old friend.

I want to see some thought in pricing as well, and that includes wines at a range of price points and prices that are not extravagantly inflated. I remember many years back when restaurant wine prices were ridiculously high, and I remember a subsequent period when prices seemed to ease. Now, maybe it is just me, but it seems that there has been a trend for higher mark-ups for the last half-dozen or so years after a time of more modest profit taking. I always cautioned my culinary students that their customers were a savvy lot and should not be underestimated. Most restaurant patrons who are regular wine drinkers consume wine at home, and they are not fools as to how much something really costs.

I am always on the look for a thoughtful selection of wines by the glass, and I especially like the practice of offering a “flight” of small pours as an affordable way to try several new wines with a dish. I do confess to particular annoyance, by the way, when a wine by the glass is priced such that a single serving has covered the restaurateur’s cost for the bottle.

I recently stumbled across a new website that addresses the concerns of wine-loving restaurant goers. Started last September and still in its adolescence, Josh Moser’s VinoServant* is an ambitious undertaking to review restaurant wine lists with an emphasis on pricing, quality and where and for how much the wines can be found at retail. For now, its focus is limited to restaurants in the San Francisco Bay area, but it is a good start, and it fills a niche in much need of filling. I plan on checking in regularly, and I wish him the best.

* http://vinoservant.com/2011/09/22/hello-world/

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
Costco: Not Wine For Dummies

Wed, 02 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Some pundits would have you believe that Costco is no more than a cynical, know-nothing merchandiser that treats wine like it was toilet paper.

Remember the game “telephone”? The one we played around camp fires as kids where you would whisper a message or short story into the ear of the person next to you who would then relay it on to the next and so on. By the time it made a complete round, it emerged so warped from its initial version that it had become unrecognizable. I sometimes think of the populist world of social media and Everyman journalism as being little more than a 21st century version of the same.

This week, the latest tea-pot tempest in the wine blogosphere has been triggered by a CNBC story on the retailing giant Costco and its head wine buyer, Annette Alvarez-Peters *. Painted by Talia Baiocchi at the Eater ** as a soulless, corporate soldier who doesn’t think wine is different that toilet paper, Ms. Alvarez-Peters is accordingly dismissed as someone who is ignorant, insensitive and knows nothing about wine. Not surprisingly, a torrent of ruffled-feather commentary has followed on a host of various websites and blogs.

I am struck by vehemence and vitriol of the brouhaha, and would urge all those who are quick to form opinions about the story to actually watch the video in question rather reacting to what someone has written about what someone said who, it turns out, may or may not know what they are talking about. Judging from the intemperate rants and ravings and reactions out there, I wonder how many have.

The brief, six-minute video clip is an interesting one, and it is well worth watching by anyone interested in wine.

Now, I do not know and have not met Ms. Alvarez-Peters, but I simply cannot see how such damning conclusions can be drawn. What I see and hear is a fairly straightforward, unassuming, very professional individual who is concerned about quality and consumer need, and who very much wants to avoid the cult of personality and celebrity status. Rather than accepting the mantle of the “world’s most powerful wine buyer”, she regards herself simply as a Costco employee. Her offense, apparently, is that she ultimately views wine as a product like everything else in the Costco corporate culture.

Ignorant? I do not see it, and, in fact, she has studied in both the WSET and Master of Wine programs and, by the testimony of a good many well-qualified people that I do know who are actually in the business of fine wine, she is a conscientious, hard-working woman who very much knows her stuff.

Does she equate wine with toilet paper in specific terms? No. But, she does understand that the two are somewhat analogous in the Costco marketing model of finding out what the customer wants, buying it at a good price, and selling it. And, since Costco apparently annually sells enough of the latter to circle the planet 1200 times, that business model is hard to argue with.

Tom Wark, a man who has both a real respect and love for fine wine and very keen sense of what effective marketing is all about, sets forward the requirements for a good professional wine buyer as being, 1) knowledge of your customers' desires, 2) knowledge of the product, and 3) knowledge of buying and market trends. Of Ms. Alavarez-Peters, he says “she knows a good deal about what her customer base wants from the wine selection in her hundreds of Costco stores around the country and that this knowledge is far more important than possessing a reverence for wine.” ***

Now, Alvarez-Peters does not need my defense. She is a twenty-year veteran of Costco and has, since 2003, done what looks to me to be a pretty good job at getting good wines into the hands of interested consumers at a good price. In the CNBC piece, respected industry analyst, Jon Fredrikson, comments that Costco has had a significant influence on educating wine consumers and raising their consciousness and appreciation of higher-end wines.

In a world increasingly populated by precocious retailers, writers and sommeliers preoccupied about lecturing me about what NOT to drink, I frankly find some comfort in knowing that there are those who are still willing to listen to their clientele.

* http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000084796&play=1
** http://eater.com/archives/2012/04/27/costcos-wine-buyer-doesnt-think-wine-is-different-than-toilet-paper.php#reader_comments
*** http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/2012/04/costco-wine-shall-i-be-offended.html

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Tasting Chenin Blanc In Its Natural State

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I remember Chenin Blanc. It was a light, aromatic wine that we grew here in California. Sadly, not much of it is around.

Some folks made it dry, and some of those used a lot of oak with it as if they were making Chardonnay. Even those heavier efforts seemed to hold onto their light, attractive, Comice pear fruit. Others were making it in a slightly sweet style that was an easy sipper yet had the acidity to work with food.

Well, I found some the other day, but it was not in California. It was here in Loire Valley at the tiny, hands-on winery, Domaine de la Fontainerie, run by Catherine Dhoye-Deruet. It was clearly a family enterprise, but this enterprise is not measured in years but in centuries. Drawing from just 15 acres of grapes grown a sloping hillside immediately above the winery, Domaine de la Fontainerie has been in the family since 1712.

The vines are old and knarly, and the fermentation regimen is not a lot newer. It takes place in old barrels using natural yeasts. Most of the wine ferments to dryness but some, especially if picked later, will stop with some residual sugar left. The very cold cellar has something to do with it, of course, but so do the wild yeasts that are simply less efficient than today’s cultured, crafted strains.

The first wine poured was dry, fresh and alive. Its aromas of crisp pear and wild flowers were enough to bring a figurative tear to my eye as I recalled wines like it in California decades ago. We can make wines like this, but so much of the land that could do it is also suited for more expensive pursuits like Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Sparkling Wine grapes.

Of course, another reason why Domaine de la Fontainerie succeeds with wine like this and California does not is that the winery costs little to run and is able to do well while picking at yields one-third to one-half of the allowed limits. So, I am not holding my breath for a CA revival—just hoping for one.

In addition to this first wine, there are several others produced that do not make it to California. A pair of dry, oak-aged wines proved particularly instructive. The wine aged in older, but not neutral barrels, was thin and had a hard time wearing its oak well. But the wine aged in new barrels swallowed the oak, kept its fruit and bright acid front and center and showed added richness that filled the wine out and mellowed it in a way that, to me, brought the acidity into balance. Interestingly, these oak-aged wines are made with grapes chosen for the purpose, not because they are richer but because they are not.

The winery also produces several variations of sweet wines, although with little botrytis, thus they are simply left to hang longer. These were wonderfully well-drinking wines with pineappley acids played against pear and orange blossom flavors.

The final wine was a Chenin Blanc sparkling wine kept three years on the yeasts. It had aged very far past the candied simplicity of too many non-Champagne bubblies from France and showed strong autolysis and a fair degree of minerality and austerity played against a bit of richness.

California could make wines like these. I wish we would.

Domaine de la Fontainerie is imported into the United States by Beaune Imports, http://www.beauneimports.com/.

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Friday Fishwrap
Save Your Money—No Wine Is Worth More Than $25

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There supposedly knowledgeable folks who make that argument. I respectively disagree.

I have been in the business of wine for a very long time, and, in every venue in which I have worked from journalism to retail from restaurants to education, the issue of value has been a constant concern. What is a fair price for a bottle of wine? Just what is a wine worth? What ultimately determines the price of this or that bottle?

Jeff Miller’s recent thoughts shared on the Artisan Family of Wines website * reminded me that those questions, while as germane as ever, are simply impossible to answer.

Now, there are those such as Fred Franzia who proclaim that no wine is worth more than ten dollars a bottle, and barking bloggers abound who damn costly wines as creation of elitist critics. There are also plenty of folks who discover upon tasting a glass of Two-Buck Chuck from Trader Joe’s that just maybe you get what you pay for. Some would argue, as did Steve Heimoff in his eponymous blog last week **, that maybe you don’t always get what you pay for.

OK. Agreed. But you generally don’t get what you don’t pay for, at least when it comes to Cabernet and Pinot Noir. And, behind every musing is the notion of what is fair and what is not.

I am not so sure that “fair” is really germane to the discussion. We live in a free market, and, very arguably, it is the consumer that decides what is or is not a fair price. There are no fixed cost-versus-profit formulas of which I am aware that come with moral force.

I would not tell someone who derives enjoyment from a glass of Charles Shaw Merlot that they are wrong, and, I suppose I wish that my pursuit of vinous pleasure could be so cheaply satisfied. I would, however, find no agreement when that same individual called me an idiot for thinking that Joseph Phelps Insignia is a remarkable wine that just might be worth the price. I believe that there are a good many wineries that undervalue their wines just as there are many that seem intent on picking my pocket, but the market is the ultimate arbiter of real worth. Discovering a great value has always been as exciting for me as tasting the world’s finest wines, but that the latter may come with prohibitive prices in no way lessens my appreciation for what they are.

Yes, there are many costs of production, marketing and capital expense that must figure into any winemaker’s calculations in running a profitable business. There are, however, no guarantees nor should there be that a wine should sell for a particular price based on the cost to produce it. Some people make good business decisions and others do not, and the consumer is not there to pay for their mistakes.

On the other hand, fine wine, at least, has been justly called “art”, and with most any art, perception and appreciation have little to do with capital cost. Hmmm, just how much did the oil and canvas of Picasso’s Guernica really cost?

Within the realm of laissez faire economics, something is worth whatever the consumer is willing to pay for it, and informed consumers are not so easily deceived. I, for one, happen to believe that there are a lot of well-informed wine consumers out there, and that if beauty lies in the eye of the beholder so does relative worth. Maybe the market will decide that no Napa Cabernet or Côte d’Or Burgundy should cost more than $25.00, but I am not holding my breath.

* http://artisanfamilyofwines.com/blog/?p=1998
** http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2012/04/16/with-cabernet-and-pinot-you-get-what-you-pay-for/

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Wednesday Warblings
Washington State Flexes Its Vinous Muscles--
and Strains a Few in Reaching to Pat Itself on the Back.

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Washington State wines are the best in the United States, so claims Governor Stephanie Gregoire.

That Washington produces some very good wines is no surprise to West Coast wine lovers, and many believe them to be among the world’s finest, but a fascinating new economic impact study from the Washington State Wine Commission is turning heads with its revelatory report of just how much of the stuff the Evergreen State now makes. *

If still well behind that of California in sheer volume and overall dollar worth, the Washington wine industry leads the way among all other American wine-producing states, and its vinous value has more than trebled in the six years since the last economic assessment. And, there are reasons to believe that bigger things lie ahead in the very near future.

The wine press has lately been rife with concern over predicted shortfalls of premium wine grapes as the American economy finds a steadier footing and a new crop of wine drinkers enters the market. Chateau Ste. Michelle President and CEO, Ted Baseler, comments that the current rate of wine consumption in the United States is growing so fast as to predict serious shortages in as few as five years, and some observers worry openly and loudly about the potential for higher prices. While that is certainly likely in any supply-and-demand economy, you can bet that the wine industry will meet increased demand with more supply, and the folks up in Washington clearly believe, as do I, that they have the land and the people to do just that on every quality level.

Now, just a few days ago, the Associated Press reported that Washington’s Governor, Stephanie Gregoire, apparently made the bold claim that no other state can compete with Washington when it comes to quality wines and, during a trade mission to Europe, dismissed California with the pithy observation that “They make jug wine. We make fine wine.”

I have a great deal of respect for Washington wines and count the best of them such those from Eroica, Poet’s Leap, Quilceda Creek and Betz Family, to name but a few, as world-class bottlings in every regard. I also understand that Governor Gregoire’s enthusiastic endorsement, while genuine, is de rigueur for the office and was probably made with a bit of smile.

Still, in the friendly but competitive game of vinous poker, I would say to Ms. Gregoire, I’ll see your Wahluke Slope and Horse Heaven Hills and raise you a Rutherford, a Russian River Valley and a Santa Cruz Mountains. And, oh yes, I am fairly certain that the Pinot Noir producers of Oregon’s Willamette Valley are not about to throw in their cards and quit the game.

* http://www.washingtonwine.org/_assets/managed/files/14984_The%20Economic%20Impact%20of%20Washington%20State%20Wine%20and%20Grapes.pdf

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Tuesday Tributes
Greetings from Gate A-22

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Travel broadens the mind and dulls the senses. It is eighteen hours since we left the house, and we are stuck here in Frankfurt airport enduring a four hour wait for our one hour trip to Paris. A couple of funny/strange things happened on the way here. the first was that we got lucky and wound up in first class on the United flight here. It was more fun than being in coach, but First Class ain't what it used to be. Or so I am told, having never been in that part of the airplane before.

Here is what I know. The wines are boring but better than coach. The food is better than coach if one reads the menu--Duck with a pomegranate glaze for me; filet mignon for Mrs. Olken. The duck, advertised as rare breast of, turned out to be overdone and smelled of liver. It was inedible. The steak was better. Mrs. Olken managed half of it before giving up. Airline food was never very good in my experience, but somehow I expected the first cabin to be better. On the other hand, the flight was made infinitely more interesting by the presence of Harvey Steiman (WS) sitting one row behind us. Both of us on our ways to Paris, and Harvey with a two-hour shorter layover. I guess it pays to work for a more powerful publication than Connoisseurs' Guide.

More later, especially if I run into Robert Parker.

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Monday Manifestos
A Green Blog—No Tree Harmed

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Well, yesterday was officially Earth Day, and I could not help but think about the growing and sometimes very silly discussions of “green” as applied to wine.*

Now, don’t get me wrong, I would not for a minute argue against, sustainable, low-impact farming and winemaking. To do otherwise would be like applauding Iran’s nuclear ambitions, finding virtue in high gas prices or condoning Secret Service high jinks in far-away places. That said, I am increasingly annoyed by the new acolytes of “green” who spend their too-few precious hours on earth worrying not only about wholly organic, certifiably sustainable, Demeter-blessed criteria, but also the absolute carbon footprint left by a bottle of good Cabernet.

I admit to having had a damn difficult time in trying to figure out just what “natural” wine really is, and now a new wrench is being thrown into the works insofar as how a wine gets to market. Apparently, that is something that should figure into my enjoyment of this or that bottle. It is enough to make me reach for something stronger than even an overripe Zinfandel.

I have heard the cries that we are drowning in an ocean of toxic, manipulated wines from cynical, out-for-the-buck winemakers that have no commitment to the vinous art and for whom “terroir” is meaningless. Now, there are those who would further make the health of the planet a critical concern in selecting just what I will pour for dinner. Heavy glass bottles are bad. Lighter plastic containers are good (really?) Land freight is bad; air freight is worse. Transport from vineyard to table by sailboat is better, and true “locavore” drinking is best...except, apparently in the minds of a goodly number of San Francisco sommeliers. I am a bit worried, however, that throughout each and every one of these arguments is a certain “guilty until proven innocent” mentality that seems to emanate from each new crop of philosophical crusaders.

Maybe it’s just me, but all of the arguments, from manipulative winemaking to destructive farming to environment-damaging shipping are framed in a way that suggests those who are doing the right thing are few yet represent a growing minority that will “redefine” how things should be done. If you are not mentioned among the elect, you perforce stand with the damned. It is the evangelist’s way.

I know a good many winemakers, and I know very few who are not conscientious and concerned about everything from the health of the land to that of those who enjoy their wines. Of them, I know very few who feel compelled to make a statement of the same and are instead foremost focused on the quality and style of what is in the bottle. The rest is a given, and I hope we are not entering an era where such commitment needs some sort of certifiable proof.

I may be naïve, but I do not happen to believe that modern winemaking has pushed us to the brink of ecological Armageddon. Good winemakers have always understood that real quality is born of attentive viticulture and viniculture, and, I believe, more do today that ever before. I do not understand the “doom is near” preaching that is lately so popular, unless of course, it is something that is redefining how wines are sold rather than how they are made.

* http://www.thedailymeal.com/green-wine-rise-taste-still-king-new-york-wine-professionals

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Friday
A Day In The Bizarre Life Of A Wine Critic -->

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Wine criticism, like all subjective criticism, can be arcane at times and inconsistent despite best efforts. It produces no new products, advances few new understandings of the world and is entirely reactive rather than being proactive.

James Conaway, who made his wine bones with his earlier book, Napa, and has gone on to other writings about wine, including a soon to debut novel entitled “The Language of Cabernet”, recently described the evaluative side of wine writing, as “a bizarre profession”. I could argue with that if I wanted to, but all the defenses of wine criticism have been heard before, and I would need to argue that what I produce is not hyperinflated rhetoric but carefully researched, thoughtful commentary.

You have heard it before. No doubt, I will trod that ground again. But perhaps, a look at my “bizarre” life will at least shed some light on the topic. If you find my day to be bizarre, so be it. I find it to be work worth doing and thus worth the striving for excellence that I and everyone involved here at Connoisseurs’ Guide bring to our work.

Let’s take a normal tasting day. We taste most days at 10:30 AM. We used to taste only in the evenings, but, as the number of wines grew and grew and grew, we found that we were tasting most nights of the week and that began to get in the way of things like sleep and seeing the family.

So, most days, we now taste in the morning. We have a more or less set schedule that sees us visit the major reds every four months while taking on the whites as they accumulate in inventory. On a typical tasting day, I go into the cellar either the night before or first thing in the morning and choose sixteen wines to taste in two flights of eight. Wines are tasted by variety, by vintage and we attempt to get a swath of wines from various appellations and varying price levels while being careful not to allow size and richness to dominate less aggressively designed wines. In other words, there is care taken to get a reasonably competitive sample.

The wines come out of the cellar about two hours in advance, are wrapped in aluminum foil and lettered by the office staff and either put on the table to warm up to tasting temperature (mid-60s for us) if red or put in the fridge to cool down if white. We chill sparkling wine and aromatic whites a bit more than dry whites, but all whites are chilled because that is the way they are meant to be consumed. Indeed, a good winemaker considers how a wine will taste when appropriately chilled as part of his decision-making regimen.

When the wines get to the table, the tasters know only the variety and the vintage. And here is where the “bizarre” comes in. We are expected to bring knowledge of the variety to the tasting. We are expected to bring knowledge of the various locations where wine is grown. And we are expected, without knowing which wines are in front of us, to evaluate each against the standards that we have worked so hard to understand. We look deeply inside the wines and, despite not knowing whether we have Napa Valley or Edna Valley in the glass, we work to construct a description that is so precise that our readers will agree with that description an overwhelming majority of the time. Because, if they do not agree, they will not subscribe to our publication the next time a renewal letter comes around.

While we are not judging the wine against a specific terroir-driven standard, we do bring knowledge of how a grape performs across a variety of sites, both here in California and elsewhere around the world. In that sense, we bring to each tasting broad understandings about the range of possibilities. We can often guess the provenance of the wine blind, but that is not what blind tasting is about. It is about judging quality against both hedonistic and known performance standards.

There are some, and Mr. Conaway, despite his intimate knowledge of the industry is one, who think that wine writing is done to please the wineries. I suppose that some writers might feel that way, but most of them do not. It is not the wineries who keep critics in business; it is the consumers. And the consumers do not come to wine publications en masse, but one at a time. It matters not whether one is the Wine Spectator or Sam’s Sangiovese Scribblings, the decision to subscribe or not is made one consumer at time.

I suppose that makes what we do a little bizarre to some. But, in point of fact, we are not much different from the makers of soap. We offer a product and people choose to buy it or not. It is not how high our “points” are that sell subscriptions, but whether or not the consumers find value in what we write.

A typical tasting lasts about three hours, ends in time for a late lunch, and then leaves time for a bit of writing or for a quick visit to a winery or to attend an outside tasting. It is bizarre, when one thinks about it. We wine critics get paid by our readers to play a game of sorts. It is a serious game just as professional sports are serious to most of those who play them. But, in truth, we look across the table at times and marvel that our jobs are to taste all this wine no matter how good or bad it is and tell the world what we think. Maybe it is not so bizarre after all. Maybe instead of leading bizarre lives, we lead very lucky lives. We taste wine for a living and need only please ourselves first and then our readers by the accuracy of our words.

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Tuesday Tributes
And Now—Some Good News About Alcohol and Politics

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I admit to being a political junkie. Not that I am that much of an activist, mind, but I do like following the day in and day out battles between the forces of darkness and the troops of saving grace. I’ll let you decide which is which.

We don’t talk much in these parts about the political aspects of the wine and alcohol business because things in that arena seem to move at a glacial pace. Even now, eighty years after Repeal, there are communities in this country that remain “dry”. There are still states that control the sale of alcohol so tightly that only they can be engaged in that practice lest the private marketplace turn everyone into drunken lunatics.

But things are changing as the country matures and the forces of moderation turn both teetotalers and boozers into responsible drinkers. We may not yet be ready to agree on whether women and their doctors or male-dominated legislatures can decide issues of women’s health, but we surprisingly are seeing bi-partisan cooperation that is meant to liberalize (and what a loaded term that has become) alcohol-controlling regulations.

The public battles regarding wine shipping have perhaps been the most visible view of this trend towards letting adults be adult about running their lives. A recent report in Politico (a valued source of information about the body politic), unfortunately entitled “States Uncork New Booze Bills”, contains some very heartening news. With New Jersey about to become an open-shipping state, such laws, as the one about to go into effect there, now exist in 39 states.

There is still a long way to go, of course. Eighteen states still run so-called “state stores”. Apparently the very same people who would privatize Social Security have so far been unwilling to privatize wine sales. And Sunday blue laws that do not permit the sale of alcohol on that “honored day” are slowly giving in to the will of the people. The example that makes me happiest comes from that bastion of conservatism, the State of Georgia, where the Young Dems and the Young Republicans banded together to advocate Sunday sales. I say “Good on ‘em”. There is hope for our young folk, after all.

Admittedly, the pace of change is still only slightly faster than glacial, but any increase in that pace is welcome news indeed. And on this day when our taxes are due, good news is better than the alternative.

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Wednesday Warblings
Pick Your Poison Carefully—Lest It Pick You

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“Poison, in this case, refers to being careful about what you choose to believe”.

There is wine news you can use and that which you can’t, but some of the silly stories that appear on particularly slow days do serve to brighten my mornings and leave me wondering just who comes up with this stuff.

I am especially fond of the new revelations born of an amazing parade of formal “studies” undertaken by seats of higher learning—things like the notion that wine professionals are biologically “different” than other folks, or that people seem to believe that better wine will be found from producers with difficult to pronounce names. You may remember those “enlightening” findings which led to laughter in these parts on earlier occasions.

Let’s be clear, however. I am not in the least anti-academic. I have very happily spent a good deal of my adult life in just that realm both searching for higher education and, then, later in life, attempting to dispense it.

But real humor inhabits that world as well, and over the past week or two, the findings of several new studies have set me to chuckling once again. Did you know, for example, that university educated women consume more alcohol than those who are not? That is the conclusion of a lengthy, multi-year study from the London School of Economics.

This, of course, prompted a response from the Alcohol Concern charity in the UK that “this raises concerns which need to be addressed.” I am unclear, however, as to what use this seeming “truth” may have and to whom. Should well-educated women be profiled as likely abusers? Will marketeers of wines and spirits devise campaigns specifically directed to this “vulnerable” group? Apparently the patterns of women’s alcohol consumption can be predicted by looking at school test-scores in girls as young as five. Now, I do seem to recall a recent story of a London wine shop selling a bottle of Champagne to a seven-year old girl, who, I must assume, was an especially bright one.

Another study that made minor headlines yesterday is a new one from France that has proved that people with tattoos drink more than those who eschew such decoration. This startling insight came from data gathered by breathalyzer-wielding researchers who tested willing subjects as they exited bars on a Saturday night. Commenting on the results, a Professor Emerita from Texas Tech not involved in the research, said that prior studies have shown that people with only one tattoo do not differ from those who have none, but that those with seven or more fall into a group high at risk of over-indulgence. I suppose we should now all be on guard for tattooed imbibers, and be especially wary of educated women who are heavily inked and holding a glass. I do wonder who pays for these studies, and just what their intent in conducting them may be.

Finally, from psychologists at the University of Illinois comes this useful tidbit. It seems that there is evidence that moderate imbibing makes for a quicker and more clever mind. When two groups of healthy young men, one stone sober and the other comprised of individuals each having consumed two pints of beer (roughly equivalent to a half bottle of wine,) were given “brain teaser” tests, the beer-drinking group performed faster and with better results. One author of the study said “the bottom line is that we think that being too focused can blind you to possibilities, and a broader, more flexible state of attention is needed for creative solutions to emerge.” No surprises there. I feel more creative and flexible after a couple of good-sized glasses of wine myself, but “blind”, all by itself, does lurk somewhere just a bit further down in the bottle. And I intend to keep a sharp eye open then next time I drive through Urbana-Champaign campus.

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Friday Fishwrap
It’s Your Lucky Day: We Discover Great Gin For Winelovers

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

No, not aged in wine barrels or distilled from fermented grape juice. This is gin whose incredible complexity could make a wine sniffer happy for hours. And it turns out that these wonderful gins are practically members of the Connoisseurs’ Guide family.

“Genius” is typically defined as a generous capacity of intellect, especially when it comes to creative endeavor. “Hyperbole”, on the other hand, means extravagant and intentional overstatement. For the purposes of this bloggish offering, it is genius that is in charge.

I spent the better part (the far better part) of my afternoon yesterday with the self-described “mad scientists” at St. George Spirits right here in Alameda, and, with respect to creativity within the distiller’s realm, I think I can say, with no intent of being in any way hyperbolic, that there is a bit of genuine genius at work at the place.

Our close proximity to many of California’s greatest wine appellations is a blessing for which we regularly give thanks, but having a distiller of such high achievement as St. George right in our back yard is, as they say, icing on the cake. Now, I admit to not dropping by as often as I would like, but, even if my visits are no more than occasional, I know that there will be something newly emerged from the still and waiting in the rows of neatly stacked barrels. Yesterday proved me right.

It has been some time since I last reported on the goings on at St. George Spirits, and, in the interim, several new distillates bearing its name have appeared on the scene. Chief among them is a remarkable collection of artisanal Gins.

Making their debuts not long ago and increasingly turning heads among Gin aficionados as the word slowly gets out, the “Botanivore”, “Terroir” and “Dry Rye” rank among the more distinctive and downright interesting Gins to be had. And, while all of a family, they speak with three very different and individual voices.

The “Botanivore” is a refined and wonderfully aromatic Gin distilled using over 20 different botanicals, and, while refreshing and vibrant, it is remarkably complex and continues to reveal a little more with each sip. It has joined Bluecoat as my gin of choice for my much-loved very dry martini. I have more than once heard, as I did again yesterday, surprised tasters proclaiming that “I don’t like Gin…but I like this!”

Even more intensely driven by herbs, the “Terroir” is intended to evoke the particular woodsy specifics of Marin County’s Mount Tam. Suffused with piney, forest-floor elements and redolent of Bay Laurel and fresh sage, it may leave some wondering if it is too much of a good thing, but it is a Gin that Gin-lovers will love.

Rounding out the trio, the “Dry Rye” wanders well off the conventional path. Despite the fact that it includes far more juniper in its recipe than either of its mates, it in some ways does not taste like Gin. It is full and fatter with a faint malty edge and a wisp of distinctive caraway spice, and it seems almost conceived with whiskey drinkers in mind. Its spicy richness brings an entirely new dimension to a classic Negroni cocktail.

The three each retail for $36.00, and they earn a nod for fine value. I would encourage those who appreciate fine spirits but are ambivalent about Gin to give them a look, and, those who like me are unrepentant champions of well-crafted Gin will be making space on their shelves for a bottle of each. Genius indeed.

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Thursday Thorns
Why Is Coppola Picking On The Little Guys?
Subtitle: What’s In A Table?

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Mr. Coppola owns a restaurant called “A Tavola” up in Geyserville. Someone else owns a restaurant called “Tavola” so far away that it is practically in another county. Mr. Coppola and his minions are doing the damnedest to prevent the little guys from using his name, and the media have chosen to side with the little guys.

Now, I don’t have a dog in this fight. I love the word “Tavola”, meaning table. I came into wine drinking “table wine”. Indeed, it was Guild Tavola Red, cost us fifty-nine cents, and we drank it in the park at age 16. Most of our peers were drinking beer at the time, but John P. (name not given to protect my mentor in this activity) and I were wine drinkers. John because he was of Italian descent and his family had wine on the table every night, and he was allowed to have a little.

I was a wine drinker because I was a beer wimp. The stuff was too bitter for my delicate palate. Of course, my palate is still delicate but somehow, by the time I graduated from college, I had also learned how to drink beer. That is a story for another time—except to say that a local beer hall called “Cronin’s” was the cause of my downfall.

The beauty of Guild Tavola Red was that it was soft on the palate and cheap. We did not have a lot of money in those days. No one got drunk because we could not afford more than one beer apiece or a bottle of Tavola Red split between John and myself. Not to digress all that much further, but with one of the new discoveries in wine being sweet reds, Johnny P. and I were light years ahead of the trend.

So it is that “Tavola” is no new word to me. There are all kinds of places in this world that use the word “Table” in their names. No need to enumerate them, but if everyone who used the word “table” sued everyone else who tried to use the name, we would have one litigious society indeed. (← Sarcasm)

I suppose I have some sympathy with Mr. Coppola. I like the guy. For a rich guy, he is pretty down to earth, and he once invited me to watch a movie with him in his backyard. I and fifty others had a good time. And there is no reason why he should not want to protect his trademarked name. We have done the same thing with the word, “Connoisseur”. Funny thing is that no one would listen. So we compete with the magazine, “Connoisseur”, as well as the Connoisseurs’ Guide to Sake, the Connoisseurs’ Guide to Beer, the Connoisseurs’ Guide to Yachts, and even The Connoisseurs’ Guide to Cannabis.

Somehow, no one has ever confused any of us with the others, and my suspicion is that no one is going to confuse Mr. Coppola’s restaurant with that of the little guys. And, that, dear readers, is why Mr. Coppola is getting a bit of a black eye in the press.

THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE requires me to tell you that the Coppola interests have a very different view of this matter. And while they say that they cannot comment because of pending litigation, they somehow have managed to comment at great length. I can’t blame them. They are getting it from all sides, and, worst of all, they are being attacked in the “blogs”. So, if you care to hear their side of the argument, I am attaching it here. Admittedly, I do not have permission to quote them, so if I get sued, please be ready to send money for my defense.

Herewith: The Coppola Statement

The Francis Ford Coppola Winery has created a unique dining experience which has been named "A Tavola". Customers travel far and wide to dine at the restaurant located at the Francis Ford Coppola Winery, for A Tavola. At these occasions, there is no menu, only an opportunity to be part of an interactive and entertaining experience. We knew of no other A Tavola restaurant, so it was natural that we took steps to protect the name by obtaining a federal trademark registration in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. When we learned that a neighboring restaurant had subsequently applied for a “TAVOLA” trademark registration for a restaurant, we became concerned. Upon researching the matter, we learned that the restaurant was told by the US Patent and Trademark Office that it could not obtain a “TAVOLA” trademark registration because they found it to be too confusingly similar to our registration. We had assumed that with the negative response from the Trademark Office that our neighbor would understand our concerns and would already be considering a different name. Instead, in January, when we tried to discuss the matter and we explained that the restaurant’s use would create confusion, our neighbor simply told us we were wrong. Our neighbor rejected our amicable efforts, even when we made it clear that our only alternative was to seek justice through the legal system.

Understandably, the media has taken up the side of the perceived smaller party, without a statement from us. The media has ignored the fact that this restaurant knew that our A TAVOLA trademark was already registered when it filed its own TAVOLA trademark application in the Trademark Office, in an attempt to gain protection for the mark themselves. The media has ignored the Trademark Office’s position. Nevertheless, this is a legal matter to be resolved between the parties (as we have repeatedly requested) or to be judged in court, not in a newspaper or a blog, so our comments are inappropriate at this time.

What we do not understand is why Mr. Coppola is being targeted and criticized as part of the reporting of this business and legal matter. Mr. Coppola is not engaged in the management of his business or legal affairs. He is the creator of ideas and images and his lawyers and business people implement and defend these ideas. If you want to hold someone up for criticism in this matter, choose me, his CEO.

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
High Alcohol Wines: Identifying The Culprit

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There is no arguing with the fact that alcohol levels in premium California wines have been on the rise for a decade or more. But, the question is why, and those reasons, while I would argue are not clearly understood, remain one of the hot-button topics among avid wine lovers. Alcohol levels have become for many a litmus test whereby a wine is automatically rejected for being over some arbitrary line, and growing sentiment for a return to some dimly envisioned “golden age” has emerged. Opinions are plenty, but solid study and research are rare, and I confess some amusement with those who idolize a past about which they have little or no experience.

A new study, however, published in the Journal of Wine Economics now takes a more academic approach to the questions and brings a bit of real thought and balance to the conversation about rising alcohol content in fine California wine *. The full article is available at the URL listed below and has been insightfully summarized by Mike Veseth in his thoughtful blog, the Wine Economist **. Both articles are well worth a read, especially by those who have grown weary of invective, conspiracy theory and opinion born of ignorance.

The influence of powerful critics is regularly cited by those who would find conspiracies, and Robert Parker and the Wine Spectator are regularly given credit. It is claimed that such critics have perforce dictated style and forced otherwise unwilling winemakers into abandoning all principle and preference for style in the crass pursuit of profit. I can point to a suspect few that might be guilty, but I know far more winemakers that absolutely are not.

Global warming and the rise of vineyard temperatures are clearly in some part responsible, and there is data that unquestionably supports the hypothesis. Significant viticultural changes have had their influences as well from the proliferation of new rootstocks during wholesale replanting due to phylloxera in the 1990s to competing schools of thought on everything from trellising to pruning to vine density and spacing.

While the article in the Journal of Wine Economics does not come up with hard and fast answers and does not ascribe weighted influence to any of the factors above, it is significant in that it recognizes that there a number of causes to the particular effect of higher ripeness and consequently increased alcohols.

Yes, as a whole, alcohol levels are up, but wines high in ripeness have long been accorded high praise, be they from various regions of France or from California during its remarkable emergence as a producer of world class wines in the late 1960s and early 1970s...seen blindly by some as the “good old days.” I recall clearly, in fact, that in the days before Robert Parker, the Wine Spectator and even Connoisseurs’ Guide, some of the most collectable and ballyhooed California wines such as the 1970 Ridge Jimsomare Zinfandel and the David Bruce Chardonnays from the 1970s were well north of 15.0% alcohol. The point is that bold, very rich wines have been prized for a very long time, and while the critical press might further demand for such wines, it did not invent them and is by no means the overwhelming cause for the steady increase in alcohols.

As we have stated numerous times in the past, when evaluating a wine, we are little concerned with stated alcohol levels high or low. Is the wine balanced? Does it is involve? Is it complex…and, does it taste good? These are my questions. Hot and pruny is no better than shrieky and shrill, and however interesting it is to understand why the California wine scene has evolved the way that it has, such concerns do not enter my mind when raising a glass.

I suppose, however, that I will be somewhat relieved if conscientious wine writers might receive a little less scorn and blame from those who incomprehensibly hold that California has lost its way. In the meantime I will, as always, leave it to capable vintners to rise and fall as they will in their efforts to express their own visions of the winemaking art.

* http://www.wine-economics.org/journal/content/Volume6/number2/Full%20Texts/6_wineeconomics_vol%206_2_Alston.pdf

** http://wineeconomist.com/

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Travels With Charlie

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

April in Carneros. May in Mendocino. Summer In Santa Barbara. It all sounds so wonderful, except that it is work, and even our trip to France, which will allow a certain down time on the weekends to visit Monet’s Gardens and Mont St. Michel, will be filled with Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc in the Loire and Calvados in Normandy.

Yes, it is the life of the wine critic. But, it is also the life of so many of us who will traipse all over the globe in search of new wine adventures. The Olkens have known the meaning of “busman’s holiday” first hand for several decades now. Not that we are complaining, mind you. When California engaged heavily in flirtations with Sangiovese, we spent a week in Tuscany. We tasted Sangiovese at Avignonesi and stopped at the most delightful taverna for a late lunch with fresh pasta and homemade sauces. The old saying that you cannot get a bad meal in Italy was never more true than on this respite from tasting and spitting.

Trips up to Washington State to learn about their wines firsthand always find us taking a day or two in Seattle. Those of us who live in the San Francisco Bay Area know we are a water-oriented community. Well, Seattle does us one or two better in that regard. The local Merlots and Chardonnays, the delights of the Walla Walla and Red Mountain AVAS are matched by waterfront seafood at Ray’s Boathouse and flying fish at the Pike Place Market.

The Carneros has its open houses scheduled for a couple of weekends from now, and the wineries there, are special enough even when there are not open houses. We love to stop at Domaine Carneros and Artesa, and if you are going up, think about making a reservation for the gallery/museum known as the di Rosa Preserve. The late and much-missed writer, collector and vineyard-owner, Rene di Rosa, founder of the famous Winery Lake Vineyard, together with his artist-wife Veronica, is remembered at this fabulous mix of garden and indoor museum set right in the midst of the vineyards.

Up at the Anderson Valley, in May, it is the Pinot Noir Festival. Lovers of that grape will find the Anderson Valley less crowded with tour busses but loaded with wineries and good wine. It is a frequent stop on our travels.

And Santa Barbara. Well, northern Californians may not trek on down for day-visits the way we can get to places like Napa, Sonoma and Livermore, but this is Pinot country with more than a dose of very good, cool-climate Syrah mixed in. We will be heading that way in June because we need to get our share of those wines as well.

It is going to be a busy summer for us. And if you are a wine lover of any stripe, there is no time like the present to spend some time wandering around in wine country.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Who Said There Is No Humor In Wine Country

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Please consider the following. Clearly some folks are chuckling as they make up these stories and the headlines to go with them.

My Favorite

Headline: Are Cement Egg Fermentors All They’re Cracked Up To Be?

Pamela Heligson at Enobytes (http://enobytes.com/) came up with this one. At first, I thought it was all an April Fool’s joke. However, the blog was published on April 4 so clearly she is either having calendar issues or she is pulling our leg. I vote for pulling our leg with one of the best puns seen in the wine blogosphere for a serious article this year.

After all, cement eggs are the new hot thing in some circles, even when they are dressed up as this one which I have pinched from Pamela’s blog. Thanks, Pam.

The Runner Up

OK, it took the headline writer three tries to make a funny, but read them all together, and these headlines for what are basically public relations releases made me laugh out loud. I hope whoever put them together like this knew what he or she was doing.

Item: Constellation Brands Inc : Reports Fiscal 2012 Results
“Positive results and strong marketplace momentum positions us well for the upcoming year." said Rob Sands."

Item: Constellation Brands forecast weak; shares slump

Item: Constellation Brands intends to launch more than 50 new wine brands and line extensions this year.

OK, at least they are fighting back, but you have to love a company that reports can report “strong marketplace momentum” leading to a weak forecast.

Look Folks, It’s Real Comedy

Louisville Juice (http://excellentproj.com/) does not get published often enough for my funny bone. It has been a few weeks, but I laughed out loud at:

Top Five Reasons the White House is No Longer Disclosing Wine Lists

March 14th, 2012 by Tom Johnson

The White House recently announced it will not release wine lists for state dinners. Here are the Top 5 reasons why the White House wine list is now a state secret:

1. President’s bias toward Illinois wine threatens electoral prospects in neighboring Indiana.
2. Plot to distract Republican base from forged birth certificate.
3. Fred Franzia was a huge campaign contributor, would be pissed to know White House opted for Black Box.
4. Doesn’t want to cause a run on Kendall-Jackson Vintner’s Reserve Chardonnay before they get the cellar re-filled.
5. Sprinkler system went off in the White House cellar, all the labels soaked off and it’s pretty much pot luck on the wine.

The Granddaddy Of Wine Comedy

The Hosemaster of Wine is published from time to time by comedian turned sommelier turned comedian, Ron Washam, who in his short life working in a winery became the master of the hoses and thus was awarded the title of Hosemaster of Wine.

Unless you are the squeamish type, and if you enjoy a good laugh out loud column a couple of times a week, you must bookmark http://www.hosemasterofwine.blogspot.com/. His current writings enjoy the title: The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Spit Bucket.

Here are few of the many reactions this scathingly funny blog has rightfully and proudly earned:

"This site should carry a warning label. It's sort of a Dave Barry/George Carlin approach to wine. The Hosemaster (real name Ron Washam) skewers fellow bloggers and industry savants with glee, while offering hilarious wine guides such as his Honest Guide to Grapes..."
--Paul Gregutt, Seattle Times

"...I consider Ron a very talented writer and I’ve long been an admirer of his scathing wit..."
--1WineDude

"And if any free sites think they can conquer the world, there’s always the Hosemaster to take ‘em down a notch."
--Tyler Colman "Dr. Vino"

"You're lucky I have a sense of humor."
--Steve Heimoff

"I must say you are an idiot. I've never liked you. I have no idea why people find you funny."
--Reign of Terroir

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
Class Warfare In The Wine Conversation

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It is not a new notion that serious wine writing has nothing to do with real people and is only directed at the wealthy and the filthy rich. That notion bothers me.

Professional writers, whatever their specialties, give a fair amount of thought to just who their audiences are. As for those of us who ply their trades in the world of wine, that audience is not a monolithic one, but rather a mix of causal consumers, connoisseurs, collectors and members of the trade whose interests and needs are widely varied.

It has been recently suggested in Tyler Colman’s popular blog, Dr. Vino*, that wine writers as a group are too easily, and perhaps mistakenly, seen as writing principally for those affluent consumers who fall within what is these days fashionably called the “one-percent”. Some may; most do not, but there are clearly so many different niches that I would caution against the notion that all wine writers should adhere to some universal standard when it comes to what wines they review and to whom they direct their opinions. And, as one whose politics are decidedly left-leaning, I am most uncomfortable with thinly disguised issues of “class warfare” making their ways into the discussion.

The rationale put forth in raising the issue of journalistic elitism is that, quite simply, not many people can really afford a steady diet of wines costing $30.00 and more. The argument thus follows that endless reviews of up-scale wines are irrelevant to most people. I would argue, however, that, while those who can afford to spend several thousand dollars a month on their cellars are indeed very few, it is precisely those very middle-class folks who occasionally splurge on a special bottle of their favorite tipple now and again who are most likely looking for a bit of guidance and advice. They are acutely aware of the value of a dollar and would like some assurance that theirs are not frivolously spent.

I remember in the early days of my love affair with wines, days when the budget was very tight, I read every word I could about the great wines even though they were rare, special-occasion visitors to my table. True, the storied bottlings from the world’s finest vineyards were proportionately less expensive that they are now (would that my income had increased by the same percentage as the first-growth Bordeaux and Grand Cru Burgundies), but they were still far from an everyday indulgence.

Being interested in and drinking a great bottle does not make one a snob. Most of us all have a passion or two upon which we spend a disproportionate amount of our income. For some folks it is cars or antiques or rare books or model trains…you get the idea. That wine happens to be the passion that may trump what some see as common sense is, in my mind, no different. Those that occasionally buy pricier bottles and those who write about them do not deserve to be tarred with the epithet of elitism.

Some angrily and irrationally claim that the wine writing community is comprised of nothing but conspiratorial stooges working at the behest of elite vintners to keep prices high. To them I would say, there is a free market out there. It usually works that in any market populated by informed consumers quality sells and crap does not, and I happen to think that those who enjoy fine wines are a smart and extraordinarily well-informed bunch.

There is enough contempt to go around the days as various voices decry the 100-point system, descriptive tasting notes and winemaking that is not “natural”. I hope that it is not now about to be directed at those who are willing to pay more than $20.00 for a bottle or at those to whom they look for guidance.

* http://www.drvino.com/2012/04/03/wine-writers-the-one-percent/

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Predictions For A Tumultuous Year Ahead

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is always better to make one’s prediction with 25% of the year gone. Predictions now take on an air of reality because there are already trends in the making. Here are a half dozen concerns that are likely to be top of mind this year.

1. A Normal Growing Year

After four years of less than ideal conditions leading to a fair bit of inconsistency in the wines produced here in California, we are likely to see a more normal growing year. Not only is the law of averages on our side but the predicted turn to sunshine later this week will start the vines off happily. We have enough water to be able to apply that life-giving potion when needed, and we had enough cold days in mid-winter to harden the vines.

2. Increased Plantings

This is where predicting gets easy if one waits. We have already seen reports that vine nurseries are being pressed hard for new plants and that shortages are appearing. Not only are wineries going to plant the so-called legacy varieties that some of the young writing and sommelier set disdain, but they will also plant a wide variety of less well-known varieties because some folks have predicted that the California future will depend on greater diversity. It is all reflective of the upturn in the economy. The wine business is just that—it is a business and it is affected by the economic cycles just like everything else. The return of good times is not just making the party in power happy; it is also making the wineries happy.

3. Wineries Struggle With Style

The pressures on the wineries to seek a more balanced (meaning less ripe) style was accelerated by a series of vintages that were less than fully heated up. Cool vintages mean longer hang times and can also mean physiological maturity in the grapes at lower sugars—and thus lower alcohols. In a more normal year, the heat accumulations in the vineyard will bring grapes to ripeness at somewhat higher sugar levels. Yet many wineries are seemingly committed to reducing the alcohol levels of their wines without resorting to harsh treatments of the finished wines in order to get there. For those wineries whose vineyards do not easily accommodate themselves to picking at lower sugars, a normal growing year is going to put them on the horns of a dilemma. Do they pick underripe grapes or not? We have seen this movie before, and the results were not pretty . Stay tuned this story will be front and center across the next six or seven months.

4. A Few Wineries Rebel Publicly

The pressures on the wineries to conform to some kind of new paradigm of lower alcohol wines and to look past the major varieties if they are going to get on the “hippest” wine lists and get attention from the new young writers and sommeliers who too often equate new and different with good and desirable has already made many in the wine biz uncomfortable. Not only did we get an unusually heavy public response to our blogs last week that addressed this “different is the new black dress” phenomenon, but we also got several dozen private responses. Many of them came from folk who have normally commented on the blog and others came from folks we only hear from occasionally. What those private communications have in common is a decided and measurable level of anger towards the “everything has to change” movement. It is clear that some folks are ready to speak out publicly and that there is building swell of unhappiness over being told by a bunch of newbies that everything they are doing is wrong. It is only a matter of time before they start fighting back against the new geekiness.

5. Maturing Wineries Sell Out To Corporate Interests

The wine boom of the 1970s created lots and lots of new, privately owned, small to medium-sized wineries. We have seen sales of places like Kenwood, Ridge, Chateau St. Jean, Conn Creek, Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars and even Robert Mondavi to corporate interests, but they are only the tip of the iceberg. For every Joseph Phelps or Chappellet or Shafer where the next generation has taken over and intends to stay in charge, there is another place where the lines of succession are blurred at best. At one point last year, it was reported that 300 of these family-owned wineries were for sale. But clearly, 300 did not turn over. With a newly growing economy will come increased sales and increased corporate ownership.

6. The Wine Blogosphere Becomes Professional

The change has been underway for some time. The early blogosphere was the home of the new and the amateurs, and it spawned, along the way, some damn fine writers like Alder Yarrow, Samantha Dugan, Joe Roberts, all of whom have dedicated followings and unique voices. But what the blogosphere also spawned was a new outlet for professional writers like Steve Heimoff, Paul Gregutt, Dr. Vino, Tim Fish and yours truly. Now we have a way to talk about topics and stories that extend beyond our paid beats and allow us to share our knowledge, insights, thoughts and pet peeves on a regular basis. And it turns out that we all have a lot to stay. Some of it is even interesting, and much of it is far more opinionated/controversial than that which we would commit to the limited and precious print space to which are words had previously been dedicated. What has happened, and the trend will continue, is that the amateur voices are being crowded out by the pros, including the new pros. Blogging will not disappear, but it is increasingly going to be the province of the quality voice.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Do Your Wallet A Favor: Try These Good Values This Weekend

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken and Stephen Eliot

This blog lives by its opinions, as do most blogs, but sometimes one must step back and drink the wine. Today is such a day.

Here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, we taste thousands of wines every year in order to bring our subscribers the best choices in California and West Coast wine. We love finding the next great wine for our cellars, of course, but we take equal joy in finding wines that we can drink day in and day out. We may taste a lot of hundred-dollar plus wines, but we don’t drink many of those three-digit extravaganzas.

Here then is a discussion of some incredibly priceworthy offerings among varieties that have been our recent tasting focus. Enjoy. Your palates and your wallets will thank you.

SAUVIGNON BLANC Sauvignon Blanc has traditionally been a category that offers up a fair share of good values as our recent tastings have confirmed once again. At the top of this month’s list of Best Buys, the refined 90-point QUIVIRA Fig Tee Vineyard Dry Creek Valley 2010 ($18.00) is a complex and deeply filled wine brimming with citrus, sage, smoke. The VOSS Napa Valley 2010 ($17.00) continues the winery’s winning ways with a well-balanced mix of varietal herbaceousness and ample fruit, while the decidedly grassy HILL Napa Valley 2010 ($18.00) is briskly balanced and long on energy. Those favoring the grape’s grassy side should also check out the zesty GREENWOOD RIDGE Anderson Valley 2010 ($18.00), while the HUSCH La Ribera Vineyards Mendocino 2010 ($14.00) gets good marks for its insistent, lightly lemony fruit and its fine sense of structure. We are especially pleased with the rounded, well-filled CHATEAU ST. JEAN Fumé Blanc Sonoma County 2009 ($13.00), and the blossomy, fruit-focused ROCK WALL Lake County 2010 ($15.00) hits the mark for real value as well. Finally, if not quite reaching full recommendation, the very mannerly, lightly toasty TANGENT Edna Valley 2010 ($13.00) does a nice job at the price, and the nervy and buoyant COVEY RUN Columbia Valley 2010 ($9.00) is nothing short of an out and out steal.

SYRAH Last month’s look at Syrah belied any idea that the variety is suffering from a serious dearth of quality examples in California, and, while we were impressed with many first-rate new releases, we were also pleased at the outstanding value offered by some. While it may not be cheap, the JC CELLARS Fess Parker’s Vineyard Santa Barbara County 2009 ($30.00) is a serious Syrah whose extraordinary richness is unmatched by most any red wine at the price, and the powerful, intensely spicy LAETITIA Estate Arroyo Grande Valley 2009 ($25.00) hits all the right varietal marks. An additional noteworthy wine, the ripe, well-polished and very complex, 90-point JC CELLARS Smoke and Mirrors California 2009 ($25.00) reaffirms winemaker Jeff Cohn’s place among the State’s outstanding Syrah producers, and the bold and brash HIGHFLYER Centerline California 2008 ($20.00) is recommended to those who like Syrahs with plenty of strength. Last, but far from least, the keenly defined and generously filled VENTANA Arroyo Seco 2008 ($18.00) wins especially enthusiastic endorsement for its ample fruit, its involving complexity and its very comfortable price.

MERLOT Much as Syrah has been underappreciated of late, murmurs about the death of Merlot are without a great deal of basis. Not only is Merlot alive and well and continues to be responsible for lots of plush and eminently affable red wines, it often affords outstanding value when measured against its high-ticket Cabernet cousins. As a case in point, the very supple, full-bodied McINTYRE Kimberly Vineyard Arroyo Seco 2009 ($19.00) is an utterly delicious wine rife with dark cherries and filled out with just the right bit of sweet oak, and the similarly sensibly priced SEBASTIANI Alexander Valley 2009 ($19.00) is sure to win favor from those who fancy Merlots on the plush, slightly riper end of the varietal spectrum. Washington State’s COLUMBIA CREST WINERY checks in with a pair of particularly noteworthy values, and both the juicy, distinctly cherry-like H3 Horse Heaven Hills 2009 ($15.00) and the slightly lighter, very graceful Columbia Valley 2008 ($15.00) deserve serious consideration from price-conscious fans of the grape, and, while finishing a scant step back from award, the eminently likeable NAPA CREEK Napa Valley 2007 ($13.00) is a lithe, well-fruited Merlot that outperforms at the price.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
This Was The Week That Was

Thu, 29 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It has been quite a week. In the last seven days, CGCW has told of potential disasters on wine lists, has praised the Mendocino County initiative to put itself more solidly on the wine map and has taken a political stand that, surprisingly, got us in trouble with very few people.

We expected yesterday’s piece on wine lists to be far more contentious than it turned out to be. Both on the blog, and on our usually quiet Facebook page, people lined up in support of our position that wine lists built totally on obscure grapes authored by sommeliers who openly profess their disdain for their “timid diners” are not to be tolerated. Even those who profess great joy at finding new wines did not exactly line up in the camp of eliminated Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from wine lists.

We expected our comments about the war on women that we see being waged in this country to get us in deep trouble with our readers. More than once, they have told us to stick to our last. Not so this time. While I am guessing that some of you gave us a one-time pass for winding up in left field, you did not attack in numbers, and mostly expressed strong agreement with our position.

But, then there was the Mendocino County comments which drew some rather heated barbs from the locals. And it is those latter comments that deserve further examination—even as I leave extended treatment of the new silly style of wine list, as professed by none other than the San Francisco Chronicle’s head wine boy, for another time.

MENDOCINO. In caps because it needs to be. I find Mendocino in need of refurbishment. The wines are often hard to find. Too frequently, they are of mixed quality, and despite a small resurgence in the Hopland area, fueled in part by Fetzer family money, it is only the Anderson Valley that is prospering in my view. That is not to say that everything else is floundering and failing. Rather, what I find is that many of the wineries up in that neck of the woods are operating below the general wine biz radar. To be sure, there are plenty of very good Mendocino wines, but their existence does not change the facts regarding how the larger wine world now views the county and its grapes and wines.

And it is that “could use a boost” sentiment that has landed me in hot water. A number of folks took to the comments section in righteous indignation at the notion that they were being, as one person said, “gratuitously dismissed”. A couple of others, one a noted winemaker and one who must be a winemaker but did not say so directly, suggested that rather than needing refurbishment, what Mendocino needed most was to be left alone.

It is the suggestion that Mendocino is better off being left to its own quiet devices that has caught my attention. The needs to improve, to get more money for its grapes and wines, to make Mendocino as famous as Sonoma and Napa, are to those folks, anathema in the first order and antithetical to the reasons why they like Mendocino in the second. I find that argument hard to counter. Who wants to mess with success and happiness?

But, then the question must arise. Why has Mendocino committed itself to an aggressive campaign intended to upgrade its cachet in the wine world? I don’t have an answer, but I can guess that it is part and parcel of the human need to be bigger, better, more famous and wealthier. In other words, it is the capitalist, entrepreneurial spirit that is now finding itself being buffered by those who like Mendocino just the way it is, thank you. I hear their complaints, and I sympathize, but, being a betting man, I am betting that Messrs. Burns and Chandler will succeed in their mission and that Mendocino will find itself at least partially spoiled by success. It has been ever thus, and I doubt that Mendocino will escape totally unchanged in the process.

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
The Disaster In Wine Lists—Out With The Tried and True; In With The Obscure

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Connoisseurs’ Guide

They go too far. The “show off sommelier” set and their sycophant friends in and about the wine biz no longer care about their customers/readers. It is as simple as that.

It just might be that for the last century or two, devotees of fine wine have been too damned stupid to understand what really is good and what is not. Maybe everyone has been blinded and bamboozled into believing that Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Syrah and Chardonnay were great wines when, in reality, true greatness has lain with the likes of Tannat, Blaufränkisch, Kerner, Counoise and most every white grape grown in Italy and points east. It is the fault of those arrogant and odious “gatekeepers” we keep hearing about. It has nothing to do with generations of connoisseurship, study and sheer enjoyment.

There is no other conclusion to be reached if one is to heed the words of a small but fairly vocal segment of the wine world these days—a segment that seems all too eager to become the new gatekeepers. I am talking, of course, about the growing group of self-possessed, “cutting edge” restaurant wine directors and their fawning followers. They see themselves as the new liberators and the champions of diversity, but you do not have to look deeply to see another, potentially more troubling side to their posturing. These new order merchants would relegate the “legacy varieties” like Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir to has-been status and go so far as to omit them from their wine lists.

In applauding a new movement to smaller, more “innovative” restaurant wine lists, the San Francisco Chronicle’s Wine Editor, Jon Bonné opined * that we are suffering, hereabouts at least, from “a communal fatigue with endless choices” and that “by purposely omitting the obvious, wine lists in Bay Area restaurants are arguably more innovative and diverse—and perhaps more radical--than ever”. And, in offering tidbits of wisdom on how to buy wines-by-the glass, he points out with barely disguised satisfaction that “as Bay Area wine directors grow bolder”, those now passé choices of Cabernet, Chardonnay and Pinot are vanishing entirely.

Has Bonné spotted a significant trend; one likely to profoundly turn the market? I would not worry. The great varietals and the wines they make need no defense from me. I have always believed and still do that the wine consumer will ultimately vote with their dollars and decide where better and best lives.

Wine lovers are not stupid. They know what tastes good and what does not. They know which folks have something useful to say and which are the fatuous gasbags. They share in the joys of discovery and the adventure of finding new and truly delicious wines, but they do not feel obligated to turn their backs on and disavow old favorites for the next pretty face. They will react with alarm and surprise when this small pack of “radicals” are found out to be frauds like the wine director of Commonwealth Restaurant in San Francisco. Still In her first wine job, she has made the astonishing admission that she has no cares for “timid diners” and adds, “I thought, well, I should have something to make these people happy…and then I realized, no, I don’t have to do that at all.”

Yeah, well, I hope that works out for her... and I am glad I am not signing her paycheck. Maybe I am, in fact, a dinosaur and stupid for still finding pleasure in the “clichéd” classics, but I am not so stupid as to patronize those restaurants who believe that I am. One rather concise reader comment to the Bonne article cited above reads simply, “Here's an idea: if you decide you know better what the ‘right’ wine is for my meal and won't offer what I want -- I'm not going to buy wine with my meal.” Amen.

To that, I can only say “Amen”. The great varieties have been around for a very long time for a reason, much longer than what I suspect will be the fifteen minutes of fame enjoyed by restaurants that are blind to their virtues of those grapes.

* http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/25/FD0A1NOHNJ.DTL&type=wine

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Monday Manifestos
How Mendocino County Can Get Ahead

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Poor old Mendo Co, sitting there in the shadow of its more famous neighbors to the south. It clearly needs a shot of Red Bull to get itself going. Oh sure, we all know that there are grapes up there near the coast—Anderson Valley anyone? And some of us have actually heard of Potter Valley and Redwood Valley and Ukiah and Talmage, which are not near the coast.

I’m sure Mendocino County has some famous wineries, but I am hard pressed to think on one at the moment not in the Anderson Valley. I mean, whatever happened to Parducci? John Parducci was running a perfectly fine old-fashioned joint with honest, not too expensive wines that competed head to head with such other famous names as Christian Brothers and Weibel. Come to think of it, whatever happened to those folks?

I like Mendocino County, and not just so I can visit some redwoods or wander out to Mendocino Village for my annual journey to the one of the world’s greatest isolated villages. Hey, I even like Fort Bragg. What is not to like about a wine country that is unspoiled by tourist busses and multimillionaires building Frank Gehry-designed wineries. Even the rich folk up in Mendocino are unspoiled.

But, clearly Mendocino County’s place in the wine world is lagging behind and needs more than an energy drink to reinvigorate its sagging reputation. I have been giving this problem some serious thought and have come up with some solutions.

First of all, Mendocino needs to hire a couple of consulting pros like Steve Burns and Mark Chandler. These are the guys who put Washington State and Lodi on the map. They had a lot to work with in those efforts, but the thing they lacked was recognition. Messrs. Burns and Chandler will get Mendocino started. And then maybe the rest will fall into line.

What Mendocino really needs is a bunch of new and significant winery startups to reinvigorate all those other areas in the county where grapes grow but wineries of note no longer exist. Take Redwood Valley, for example. It was put on the map by Fetzer, Lolonis, Fife and others, but where are those names today? And, thus, where is the Redwood Valley today? Still there presumably, but not often seen on labels in this neck of the woods.

There are ten overlapping small area appellations (AVAs) in Mendocino County. Take this test. Name them. Then look to the end to find out who they are.

Mendocino has a problem alright, and it will not be easily fixed. There is not a lot of there there. For sure, and I do not mean this in any but the most polite way, there are wineries and vineyards that deserve attention—just not enough once one gets beyond counting the important players in the Anderson Valley.

I like Mendocino County. When Earl Singer and I started Connoisseurs’ Guide back in the dark ages, it was one of the first places we visited outside of our usual haunts. We discovered beauty and tradition, and we discovered potential. Anderson Valley has realized its potential. The Mendocino Ridge area to the west and south of the Anderson Valley and closer to the coast but also at higher elevations has produced some fine Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs lately, but aside from one lone Zinfandel that the Anderson Valley’s Handley Cellars sourced in the Redwood Valley, we are hard-pressed to think of any significant wines from other Mendocino locations that have showed up in our tastings in the last several years.

Good luck, Mendocino. You are still beautiful, you are still unspoiled and you are still full of potential.

Meet the New CGCW

Mendocino County AVAs: Anderson Valley, Cole Ranch, Covelo, Dos Rios, McDowell Valley, Mendocino, Mendocino Ridge, Potter Valley, Redwood Valley, Yorkville Highlands.

Friday Fishwrap
Trouble in Paradise? A Quiet Reminder That More is not Always Better

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We in the business of fine wine would do best to remember that as good as a wine might be, more is not always better.

France is reportedly struggling with a serious spike in binge drinking by its twenty somethings and has blamed it on the besotted English. Among said crowd, there seems to be a growing fashion for getting drunk as quickly as possible via gatherings known as apéro géant parties. Through the use of social networking sites, the parties have attracted thousands of participants, the biggest of which was a gathering in Nantes last Summer. Happily, the worst that seems to have happened in that case was that a few inebriated attendees had to be fished from the Loire River by a pre-positioned boat placed by forward-thinking local authorities.*

Well, drunken hooliganism has apparently come to Sonoma**, and nobody is blaming the British. It is one of those “almost funny” stories, but it really is not. Apparently the hamlet of Healdsburg was beset by what one shop-owner called “incredible drunkenness” during two successive Wine Road Barrel Tasting weekends earlier this month. So bad, it seems, that local Healdsburg merchants are voicing their concerns despite the obvious rise in business that the weekend brings. Kudos to them!

The topic of “sensible” drinking gets a good deal of lip-service in our business, but a reminder for responsibility here and there never hurts. Here, a weekend of barrel tasting seems to have gone wrong, and, if downtown Healdsburg had its problems, I wonder what the highways connecting the 144 participating wineries must have been like.

I’d like to say that this is a rare anomaly for large scale events, but anyone who has stayed to the end of ZAP’s or the Rhone Rangers’ grand tastings or the follow-up public tasting of the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition knows otherwise. There will always be a few folks who wander well outside the lines, and their impact always seems to be greater than their numbers.

Overindulgence is always a touchy topic in our business, but being touchy does not mean it should be ignored. I have no more use for the “Always-Say-Yes Permissivists” than I do for “Just-Say-No Prohibitionists”, but I do not want to see anyone hurt. I am certain that same sentiment is shared by all of those who make, review and drink fine wines.

I hope my Friday musings are not likened to the self-serving corporate messages to drink responsibly, which are always muttered in low volume at the end of this or that beer commercial. They have always sounded fairly hollow to me. “Drink responsibly,” (but, please, drink…a lot).

There are new generations of wine drinkers coming along. We hear about them every day, and how they will transform the market. I understand that they do not give a diddle for critics and willfully follow a drum beat of their own. I, for one, hope that they all prosper and ultimately have cellars filled with the very best wines. And I hope they are around to drink them.

* http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/17/lyon-reduce-le-binge-drinking
** http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_20223014/incredible-drunkenness-young-crowd-takes-over-sonoma-wine

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Thursday Thorns
A Wine Drinking Nation Declares War On Women

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I am a winewriter. I don’t do politics. Today I want to talk about booming wine sales in the good old U. S. of America. Mrs. Olken wants me to talk politics.

When it comes to wine, I can tell you the ten reasons why Napa Valley Cabernet continues to grab the lion’s share of the upscale wine dollar among California enthusiasts and then go on to discuss the ten reasons why Pinot Noir is catching up fast. I can cite history. I can name names. I can examine the viscera of these phenomena vintage by vintage by vintage and then some. It is what I do. I have intimate knowledge on my side, and even when others may disagree with me, they will find it hard to disprove my theses.

Not so with politics. It does not matter that I have opinions galore about the body politic. It does not matter that long discussions of health care systems, the virtues and evils of capitalism and related tax policy, the rights of women, gays, animals and gun owners are part and parcel of life here in northern California. I simply do not know enough to be a political commentator—in print.

And so, on this second day of Spring, I find myself on the horns of dilemma. I am looking at a Hobson’s Choice of some forty years making. That is how long I have been a wine collector and that is equally how long I have been happily attached to Mrs. Olken. Today, Mrs. Olken thinks it is time for all Americans, including her loving and mostly obedient husband, to take a stand on the fast-erupting war on women that she sees happening in this country. Hardly a day goes by when some legislator in Idaho or Texas or Virginia or Washington, D. C. does not propose new laws that would push women back to the dark ages. And Mrs. Olken is fighting mad.

OK, I get it. And I agree with it, and in so saying, I am crossing a line that I care not to cross. This blog is not called The Political Connoisseur’s Blog. It is called The Wine Connoisseurs’ Blog. I am fighting mad. There I have said it again. The rights of my wife and my daughter would be trampled upon on folks who want to blame women for rape and incest. There is even a Presidential candidate who says a woman who finds herself pregnant in such situations should be thankful, yet this same Neanderthal would deny women the right even to birth control. Well, now I have gone and done it. I feel a lot better now that Mrs. Olken will speak to me again. (N. B. That was intentional exaggeration.)

And now I can move on to the news of the day in the California Wine Industry. Today, the wine sales statistics for 2011 have been released, and sales volume measured by case sales grew by close to six per cent while dollar volume increased by almost ten per cent. Those are massive gains by any standard. And what is even more pleasing is to look back for historical comparisons. When I came into winewriting, the United States was a piker in per capita consumption of wine. Put simply, this was not a winedrinking nation back in the 1970s. Today, we consume four times as much wine per person, and while we still do not rank near the top of the list of per capita wine drinking nations, we are now no longer an afterthought. There are massive statistics to be found on this subject on the website of The California Wine Institute. Even a statistics collector like me (if I had not found wine statistics to collect, I might have a library of hundreds of baseball statistics books) dares not bring them all out at one time lest you and I both fall asleep at some point. Let’s just say that the sun has shown nicely on California wine sales this past year and leave it at that. That topic may not be as momentous as politics, but I am a lot more comfortable in this realm than in that other.

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
Critics vs. Sommeliers—The War Comes Out into the Open

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I suppose when I think about, I must admit that there has at times been a certain tension between sommeliers and wine critics, one that has ebbed and flowed over the years. I always thought that it was a good kind of tension, one that worked to keep all parties of the collegial wine profession honest. Call it symbiosis, if you like, but now I am informed that what has been going on for the last 30 years is a war!

A couple of days back, our winewriting comrade, W. Blake Gray, offered his thoughts about sommeliers, critics and the latter-day dynamic between them in an article on Palate Press entitled “The 30-Year War.”* There are some points with which I agree and some with which I do not, but, as I believe good journalism is that which causes the reader to think, I can comfortably recommend the piece. Mr. Gray’s central idea is the notion that wine consumers can gain value in achieving some form of comfort level with those in the profession of choosing and recommending wine. However, the consumer, Gray argues, will find themselves running smack into a simmering thirty-year war that has been going on between sommeliers and critics. And that rather grand assertion has most set me to thinking.

The article casts the battle in very specific terms -- between sommeliers and Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate and the Wine Spectator – and does not address the broader critical world that includes smaller, more specialized publications, magazines, newspaper journalism or the unlimited musings of bloggers. Still, the central issue over which the war is being fought is, if I read the piece right, whether low-alcohol/high-acid wines are inherently better than those bolder, more flavorful offerings that emphasize ripeness and unbridled fruit. That, of course, is the debate that seems to claim far more attention than any other in virtually every wine conversation these days, and, if critics and sommeliers are seen as being the two protagonists, most everyone else, be they consumers, retailers or writers, are inevitably forced to declare their allegiance to one side or the other.

I wonder at what happened to the joys of diversity? What happened to the idea of friendly disagreement, of being able to respect another’s taste and preference for style without the need for condescending dismissal of opposing opinion? I have been in this business for a very long time and until recently have always felt very strong fraternal connection with those who shared my passion for wine. Now, I am not so sure.

In my college years, I was a great devotee of Kurt Vonnegut, and I recall his creation of a new lexicon in the brilliant Cat’s Cradle that was meant to explain the workings of the world. One word in particular comes to mind now, that of the “granfalloon”, defined as a group of people who imagine they have a connection that does not really exist, one whose mutual association is actually meaningless. Vonnegut’s examples include “the Communist Party, the General Electric Company, and any nation, anytime, anywhere." I wonder if the wine profession is now revealing itself to be just that, a “granfalloon.”

Mr. Gray, you may be right. Perhaps there is a war going on. I hope you are wrong. As with most wars, ancient and modern, it is the non-combatants that ultimately suffer the most. If there is, in fact, a war afoot, I fear it is one that will have no winners.

* http://palatepress.com/2012/03/wine/the-30-year-war/

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
In The Vinous Twilight Zone, The 2011 Wines Have Become Superstars

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If you think you have grown tired of the “alcohol” debates, just you wait. These three cooler vintages are plunging us into the Twilight Zone of this endless debate.

I don’t want to belabor the point because there is nothing inherently right or wrong with any alcohol level in my way of thinking. It is not the label statement or even the scientific measurement that determines if a wine tastes good. It is the wine itself. But sometimes the purveyors of the “low is best” argument seem to be living on another planet.

Yesterday in San Francisco, a bunch of wineries got together to pat themselves on the back about their balanced wines. One maker, whose wines have generally done well in CGCW ratings, was bragging that some of his 2011 Chardonnays were as low in alcohol as 13.1%. Now, I have two problems with that proposition on its face. The first is that he was not showing those wines so there is no way to judge how they taste. We can take his word for that, but (and I do not mean this unkindly) winemakers love their children and they seem to love their latest children best of all. That is why we have independent critics in the wine business instead of simply having the winemakers tell us how many stars or points their latest creations should get.

But even more bothersome than that, because what would one expect a winery to do, is the notion that somehow a bizarre vintage like 2011 is proof of anything except being unrepeatable. There are going to be good, low alcohol wines from the vintage, especially in the early ripening varieties like Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, but there are going to be some absolute dogs.

No one is against the notion of restrained alcohol, but, folks, unless you want to return to the days of thin, anemic Cabernets in most vintages and Zinfandels with as many green berries in the hopper as red, you are going to have to accept that making the greater majority of the later-ripening varieties is simply not in the cards.

And for me personally, it would be a shame and a mistake for everyone to try to make Chardonnays that bristle with acidity and not make wines with richness and depth. The most expensive White Burgundies, the Le Montrachets, did not get their reputations or their pricing by the restraint. And unless we try to make California into something that it is not, we will not make nearly so much great wine if we try to make everything at 13%. The 2011 vintage, with Sonoma Coast Chards as low as 13.1%, is an aberration. But beware, because in the vinous Twilight Zone, folks will tell you that they have discovered the way to greatness when all they have discovered is the results of one unique vintage, and then only as those results apply to early ripening varieties.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Not So Guilty Pleasures Of Full-Flavored California Cabernet

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I know it’s not hip to say so, and I suppose that my love of good, really good California Cabernet will bring sneers from the new wine cognoscenti that prize “soaring acidity” and a “profound mineral presence” above all else. But I admit it...I happen to enjoy big, deep, wonderfully rich, brimming-with-flavor Cabernets Sauvignons.

Please know, I am not defending the corpulent, excessively alcoholic few that have their souls literally cooked out of them, but when you actually look at the long list of fine California Cabernet producers, you will not find so many offenders as some would have you believe.

We are putting the final touches on the April edition of CGCW, and Cabernet Sauvignon is the featured wine. As is our policy, any wine that is up for high recommendation is tasted a second time before going to press, and, as usual, that means there is a considerable number of very good leftover bottles crowding my kitchen counter. They will not go to waste.

After a long tasting session yesterday, I grabbed a new favorite, the Aurielle Napa Valley 2008, and poured an immensely satisfying couple of glasses with the perfectly cooked, rare Niman Ranch rib eye that was dinner. For the life of me, I cannot see how someone would complain at such a combination.

I cannot say I am all that bothered by some folks telling me I am wrong; to each his own. But, their evangelistic fervor and the seeming need to change the world by eradicating the scourge of such wines does gives me pause for cause. Hey, there are plenty of anemic French reds, and Italy has more than a few too. Oh, and don’t forget the new terroir-driven reds of Germany, Austria and Greece. I would remind the crusaders that they have a wealth of smaller sized wines of “nuance” from which to choose, so just drink them and please leave me alone.

I was particularly pleased to see that in the March issue of Food & Wine magazine, executive wine editor Ray Isle seems to agree. I cannot say that I am always a fan of said publication, but I think Mr. Isle is dead on in this instance, and I humbly give him a nod of respect. It appears that he, too, has grown tired with the droning whine against Cabernets that are damned as being too big and too flavorful. And, he is keenly aware that most people who are not sommeliers or their fellow travelers actually seem to like them. Amen.

I adore great Burgundies, and I relish classic Loire reds and whites. The great Rieslings of Germany have been high on my list of favorites for forty years, and Barolo, Barbaresco and the best wines of Rioja are always welcome at my table. There are even times when I do not mind screechy acidity, or at least mind it less, but there are menus that want intense, deeply drawn and outgoing red wines…times when absolutely nothing else will do.

Even as I write this appreciation of full-flavored wines, I can smell the Bolognese meat sauce for this evening’s pasta that has been slowly simmering for the last several hours. A nice Barbera might do the trick, and Sangiovese or a good Côtes du Rhône would not be a bad idea at all, but there’s a bottle of Ravenswood’s latest Teldeschi Zin waiting, and I could not be happier.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Critics Cannot Sit On The Fence And Still Be Relevant

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The operative question, whether we are talking about quality in wine or movies, cars or restaurants is “How good is it”?

Winery relevancy was the topic of yesterday’s CGCW Blog, and the question of which wineries do and do not have it are and how it might be gained and lost proved a lively discussion with different perspectives enough to leave the questions largely unanswered in any absolute sense.

Well, the question of relevancy looms large in a host of hot topics in the wine world these days, and those about the validity of critical rating systems remain among the more relevant yet polarizing threads of them all. Is ranking relevant? Is it on an inevitable and absolute decline? Does it have any value and if so to whom? Is it here to stay? Yes, no, yes and yes are and have been my own answers, but a noteworthy event in food journalism and a couple of subsequent, very insightful comments I read this week have set me to thinking. They made me a little more convinced and comfortable in my views.

First, I want to say that what follows is not one more labored, defense-under-fire argument for the 100-point system. And, it has nothing to do with Robert Parker’s latest round of very magnanimous, headline-making 2009 Bordeaux scores. Although I do find myself chuckling over coffee this morning at those who crow of Mr. Parker’s demise and growing irrelevance. What he does and does not do still sets the blogging world to frenzied yapping unlike anything else I have seen, and I suspect that most hostile voices are those of people who do not and cannot buy the wines that Parker praises. Influence dramatically on the wane? Hopelessly stuck in the muck of insignificance? I do not for a moment think so, but that, dear readers, is a topic for another day.

No, and back to the point, today’s musings arise from last week’s shift in editorial policy at the Los Angeles Times whereby restaurant reviews will no longer come with star ratings. The editors offered among their reasons that “the stars have never been popular with critics because they reduce a thoughtful and nuanced critique to a simple score”. The topic at hand is not wine, but the issues are the same for critical reviews of restaurants and wine, and, while I can hear the anti-score cadre howling with pleasure and waving their manifestos with revolutionary zeal, a few thoughtful voices have emerged as well.

One that rings particularly true comes from Michael Bauer, executive food and wine editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, who writes in response to the Times’s announcement that...

I, and many other critics, have a love-hate relationship with rating systems. However in the end I come down on the side of the star rating, as difficult and sometime as incongruous as the stars might seem.

As a critic, stars make us get off the fence and distill what we think into a concise rating. Yes, it may shortcut the review, and many people will start by looking at the rating, but I also think they go back and read the review… forgoing ratings lets the critic off the hook. I’m not sure whether that’s good for readers, or what readers want.

It’s not an exact science and there’s bound to be confusion, but in the end a rating gives a ballpark view and aims the reader in the right direction. Even if it seems inconsistent to the reader, it’s not to the reviewer; the rating reflects how we actually feel taking everything into account. Without that rating burden, readers would be left completely on their own to decipher what a reviewer has to say.

Now, I have always felt the same love-hate relationship with the 100-point wine-scoring system, but, as much as I prefer something a bit less definitive and allowing for a little more “wiggle room”, it is the undisputed standard of the day and cannot be ignored. The idea that some kind of rating is useful as a quick and useful reference point for most consumers is something we here at CGCW have always held. What I was most struck by in Michael’s comments, however, is the idea that ratings make us critics “get off the fence” and work a bit harder.

Yes, the work of a good critic should not be easy, and our job is to take a position, to make informed judgment and not to simply compose fanciful prose that leaves the reader wondering just where we stand. I think those who fret about having their “thoughtful and nuanced reviews” reduced in meaning by the imposition of some sort of ranking may be, in fact, a little too nuanced and self-indulgent for their readership.

When I turn to critical reviews about wine, food, music, the theater et. al., I am not looking for “nuance.” I am looking for well-informed, clearly stated opinion. I want to know what this or that professional thinks is good, better and best and why. That, I think, is the job of a professional critic: to be accurate and consistent and willing to, as Michael says, “get off the fence.” Tom Wark often writes in his Fermentation blog (http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/) that curious consumers are looking for information that comes with the weight of “authority,” and “authority” should be willing to make the call.

Now, I know of no critic that gets every call right, but a measure of success in any critical endeavor is the longevity that is born when most of their readers find agreement and meaning most of the time. Umpires who try to please everyone with concerns for big-tent “perspective” and stop for round-table committee discussions on every play will not reach the big leagues, and neither will those critics who are unwilling to make the call.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Who Is Relevant In 2012?

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Steve Heimoff blogged today about relevance. He borrowed the topic from something he read on Blake Gray’s blog who wrote about a new blog/online publication entitled Loam Baby. You can look it up. I am borrowing the topic from all of them because I like it.

First of all, I need to explain that the comments below started as a response to friend Heimoff who offered his own unique view of relevance in which Diamond Creek was relevant but Trefethen may not be, and in which Napa was relevant but Sonoma was less so. I start out by explaining to friend Heimoff that neither he nor I live in a complete world and thus our views of relevance may be different from those of others. More on that later—based on comments to Heimoff and me over on the Heimoff blog.

“The question of which wineries are relevant and which are not is harder to judge than you think. You and I are not out there in the real world of relevance much. We taste everything and we issue our opinions, but we don’t do much market research.

If we did, we might conclude that Rombauer is relevant because it sells so much wine and Diamond Creek, despite making good wine for four decades, is not especially relevant by any modern standard.

I was surprised by your inclusion of Trefethen and Chappellet in the “possibly less relevant” category. To my way of thinking, Trefethen is a quite vibrant winery with a style that has become more relevant as the world looks for sleeker, more lithely balanced wines. And, I also think that Trefethen wines have gotten better over time. It is hard for me to think of them as not relevant.

Chappellet is a different case. They sit up there in the fancy hills to the east of the Napa Valley and are surrounded by fancy, fancier and fanciest names and their Cabs and Chards remain attractive in my tastings. Maybe I am missing the point, but if relevance is at least partially driven by a continuity of good wine that has adjusted to changes in winemaking technique over time, then Chappellet is also relevant in my scheme of things.

All of which brings me to wineries that have fallen out of favor because their wines have not kept up. To me, those are the ones that are not relevant if we define relevant by constancy and quality. Heitz and Freemark Abbey would be poster children for the loss of relevance by those measures. Jordan and Sonoma-Cutrer over in that other county (which is also relevant in my view) hit my list of reduced relevance.

I have no idea how much wine any of those brands are selling. All I know is that they do not measure up in the way I would measure relevance.

All of this is meant to say that the term is a tricky one, and it depends on how it is defined. I would guess that some folks would only measure relevance by the new, hot styles and wineries and would find Scholium Project, Harvest Moon, Donkey and Goat, Pey and Peay to be much more relevant in today’s world than anything from the “established” groups and places. No knock on any of their wines—many of which have rightly highly in the pages of CGCW, but their relevance to the new paradigm can only measured by using the new paradigm as a measure of relevance.

The comments section over at the Heimoff blog quickly informed me that Jordan and Sonoma-Cutrer continue to sell lots of wine. In fact, they are the top restaurant brands in their varietal categories and numbers two and three overall. So much for my definition.

But, so much for any limited definition. There are lots of ways to be relevant. Quality in at the tops of my list. Consistency is right up there with it. Value comes in right behind them if only because I am a quality buyer for my own cellar and a quality reviewer in CGCW; thus value is an adjunct to quality but not its equal. Sales never enters into my personal equation when it comes my view of wine relevance, but, of course, it does have a certain standing in wine publication relevance. For example, the Wine Spectator is one hundred times larger than CGCW in readership. CGCW may be more relevant to a handful of folks but not to the larger readership audience.

Still, I will take my definition any day. Give me quality and consistency. For me it trumps sales or drama or the latest “here today/gone tomorrow” big thing.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Throw Out Those Decanters

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

True confessions time. I agree with the French on this. No need to decant young wines.

Yes, heresy in many quarters, but I have decanted and I have not decanted and seen no appreciable difference. I have read studies and interviews and opinions, both informed and utter guesswork, on the subject, and I can tell you that you will find no scientific evidence that decanting young wines helps.

You disagree? Quel surprise. Most people do believe that young wines, especially heavy reds do open up with airing. I disagree—for the most part.

Let’s take a step back and look at what is supposed to happen with young wines when decanted. They are supposed to pick up some air, just like, some say when they sit in the bottle for years. The problem with that argument is that they pick up no air in the bottle. That is why bottles have stoppers—to prevent air from getting to the wine.

Well then, perhaps you believe that aeration softens tannins and makes young, tough wines more approachable. To this, I can say that study after study has shown that decanting does not have any effect on tannin. Tannin is not air-soluble.

Okay, so the one final and semi-good argument for decanting is the notion that air does make a wine tastier by oxidizing it. I kind of agree with this notion. Closed in wines can sometimes open up with aeration. I have seen it happen in our tastings. Some wines change in the glass over the course of the hour they are in front of us. Does this phenomenon undercut my thesis? Hardly.

The very act of pouring the wine into a glass and swirling it to allow the wine to coat the sides of the glass and thus to evaporate and volatilize its esters gets a wine every bit as much air as decanting it from bottle into one of those incredible pricey crystal decanters you have collected along your journeys on the wine road. Mine are from Riedel and Baccarat. They are simply gorgeous pieces of art. But they do not do much for young red wines that would not be done by the normal acts of pouring and swirling.

Just a couple of years ago, the wine professors at Fresno State College, the learning ground of so many young vintners these days, did a twenty-taster study. Each taster was presented with two samples of the same wine—one of which had been freshly opened and one of which had been decanted. The tasters, all professionals (not professors or students) identified no appreciable differences in the samples and had no preference for one over the other.

But, in truth, I don’t much like such studies. Too many variables, too many questions about who know what and how the tasting was presented to the tasters, let alone about the wines, their storage, age, etc.

For me, I must go back to my early training ground in wine—France. The story is too long to tell about a summer spent there after my freshman year in college, but I did progress from Gallo Hearty Burgundy drinker to Beaujolais and cheap reds from the Rhone after that. And the French, whether I was in a tiny neighborhood café or in one of those nicer meals that my uncle, who found me and showed me the fancier side of France for week, paid for, “the French” did not ever decant wine except that which had never been bottled and came to the table in carafe. If the French do not stand on ceremony, why should I?

And one final note. The practice of pulling the cork early so the wine can breath is, to my way of thinking, even more nonsensical. How can a spot of wine no bigger than a dime aerate a whole bottle of wine? If you do believe in aeration, then please, at least decant. Pulling the cork and letting the wine sit open has no practical or measurable effect in my experience.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
CODA: Biology, The Value of Wine Expertise and the Din of Barking Poodles

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I am beginning to think that the wide world of wine discussion is not so dissimilar to the ideological conflicts of the political left and right. Most every topic has its two sides lined up along an indelible line that immutably delineates two opposing camps, and, even when the topic is not one that seems to invite debate, it is quickly recast as a bi-polar issue imbued with evangelistic right or wrong fervor.

Is a wine natural or not? Is it above or below a specific alcohol content? Do scores matters? Is expertise real, and, even if it is, does it actually have any worth? These are not only the endlessly replayed hot-button questions that keep the wheels of contemporary wine conversation turning, they insidiously surface in almost every discussion whether they are germane and relevant or not. Worse, they are increasingly cast in black-or-white terms, and the infinite gray spaces that, in fact, exist in between sides seems almost wholly ignored. Yes, I miss the “grays”. That is where real balance and insight are most usually found.

A couple of days back, I voiced my amused disagreement with an academic study that suggested that so-called “wine experts” were inherently more sensitive tasters and biologically inclined to their chosen profession. “Self selecting”, I believe was the term used in the report, and the conclusion that followed was that being inherently “different”, wine experts were irrelevant to the larger, presumably less-sensitive market. The particular burr under my saddle was the notion that biology rather than experience, practice and study defined a wine expert, and I felt no need to defend my or anyone else’s relevance. There seems, however, to be a great many who do and an equal number who squeal with delight at being handed scientific “proof” that wine experts are the deviant bunch they always believed them to be. It didn’t take long.

A lively debate has unfolded on various wine websites, one that is filled with defense, vitriolic attack and dismissal. A few who harbor utter distain for critical reviews have been quick to jump in with their “the king is dead, long live the people” line of reasoning, and one happily dances on the grave of critics by citing the broad-based popularity of Moscato and sweet reds as proof “that people are finally embracing their own taste – which is what the wine industry has been professing for decades.” Finally? Really? I seem to recall that Blue Nun, Lambrusco and candied White Zinfandel were monstrously popular and enormously lucrative in their days …and the notion that the “industry” catholically encourages everyone to follow their own individual path is as ridiculous as the idea of a wine-expert genotype.

Wine experts, from sommeliers and retailers to critics DO have their places, but those places are specific and not general. The only “experts” that influence the very broad market that is presently transfixed by Moscato and sugary reds are marketeers. As for the smaller segment of the wine-drinking population that takes wine somewhat more seriously, expertise is relevant and will remain insofar as it provides reliable and sensible advice, the ultimate value of which will be decided by the consumer, not someone ranting on this or that electronic forum.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Not So Random Thoughts From A Random Mind

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Did you ever have a day like this? Everyone you run into wants to know something.

I was asked today, by a complete stranger, where I would go in the wine country if I had only one winery to visit. I stammered my usual response—I have fifty or one hundred favorites but not one. That may sound like a copout worth of a Republican presidential candidate ducking questions about Rush Limbaugh, but it is not.

I truly like visiting wineries and it does not matter whether it is fancy new places like the Williams Selyem or the barn-like facility in which that winery used to be situated. It does not matter whether it is some remote location like Adelaida high in the hills west of Paso Robles or the urban warehouse in downtown Oakland that houses JC Cellars and the Dashe winery.

But being the polite fella that I like to try to be, I then went on to mention a few places that have drawn me back time and time again because there is a special quality to them. Not to belabor the topic, for I have other topics to belabor as well, but among the places I have visited on multiple occasions are Hess, Robert Mondavi (the best tours for first-timer--and somehow all my relatives and college friends have, at one time or another, “allowed” me to lead them on a tour of the Napa Valley), Sterling, Clos Pegase, Gary Farrell, J, Hop Kiln, Paradise Ridge, Bella, Roederer and about thirty others.

I was asked today by a good friend if my attention to blogs (the reading of other people’s blogs) had waned lately because this blog does not mention as many of them as it used to. And I had to admit that it was true. There are only so many useful topics in the wine world and with so many competent bloggers writing from three to five blogs a week, there is far less to say than there used to be. I mean, how many times can we beat up the dreaded 100-point system, the dreaded three-tier distribution system, the dreaded “natural wines vs. industrial wines” debate or any of the other dreaded topics over which we writers like to wring our hands in public.

Still, there are variations on the theme from time to time. Whether it is gaffes or guff, pontification or ponderous prose, we bloggers muddle through. Besides, no matter what happens, it seems that someone or something manages to set our teeth on edge on a regular basis and, lo and behold, another blog is born. Witness this week’s flap when Robert Parker awarded nineteen separate 100-point scores to 2009 vintage wines from Bordeaux. I don’t know who counts these things, but it did amuse me that Mr. Parker also awarded a passel of 99+, 99, 98+ and 98-point scores. I forget who said it, but I am beginning to agree with the notion that Mr. Parker is intentionally destroying the validity of the 100-point rating system so that no one will use it after he has gone.

Okay, maybe that is too cynical. But the thought did amuse me when I read it.

I was asked today by a good friend if I was interested in reviewing Sangiovese. The question was asked because Connoisseurs’ Guide has ignored the local production of that grape for several years now since we have found so few of them to be satisfying and recommendable. The question was asked, of course, because the asker has a new Sangiovese and would like to see an assessment of it in print. Since the question was asked in email, I have taken a few days to respond. I like good Sangiovese. California has produced a few of them but “few” is the operative word here. It would be easy to say “thanks but no thanks”. After all, our editorial calendar (we call it a tasting schedule) is already overloaded, but just as we went back to Cabernet Franc and Petite Sirah and found them greatly improved, so too might we find the same causes for optimism among a batch of Sangioveses.

Happily, the day ended with an easier question. Shall we have the grandkids over for dinner after soccer practice? That answer took no equivocation.

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings
Pseudo Science Hits The Wine World Again

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It is reaching epidemic proportions, this need to try to make science out of art, and the wine world has become ground zero for far too many would-be statisticians.

Over the last couple of weeks, these maker-uppers of fact out of stranger-than-fiction have told us first that a significant percentage of wine drinkers prefer wines with lower alcohol made from Cabernet and Chardonnay even though such wines do not exist and are not likely to exist and then that people actually prefer wines from wineries with tongue-twisting titles over those whose names are easy to say. Now, comes the news from “academia” that wine experts, through biological imperative, may self select for the profession and that their opinions may, in fact, be wholly irrelevant to the average consumer because they recognize bitterness in wines.

A new bit of research* coming from Penn State University, yes THAT Penn State, and reported in the March issue of the American Journal of Enology and Viticulture makes the claim “that the fundamental taste ability of an expert is different,” -- wine experts, in this case-- and follows with the question “if an expert’s ability to taste is different from the rest of us, should we be listening to their recommendations?” As proof of said “difference”, it seems that those in the study who were deemed wine experts demonstrated more sensitivity to propylthiouracil bitterness than the “average” or casual wine drinker. God, I just love this stuff!

Now, I confess to some comfort in the fact that this undermines the credibility of all wine experts for a change…retailers, sommeliers, educators, et. al., and not just on those of us who inhabit the journalistic world. I feel so much less exposed and vulnerable, but the conclusive leap to the notion that because of one’s inherent biology “expert recommendations in wine magazines and journals may be too subtle for average wine drinkers to sense” simply sets my head to spinning.

While the report grudgingly concedes that “prior experience matters”, the claim that biology may be primary rings rather hollow to me. I thought all this time that wine appreciation or that of music or art or fine foods was very much grounded in experience, study and practice, and I believe that most anyone is capable of finding a great deal of agreed-upon character, both strident and nuanced, in a given glass of wine should they have an interest. I have seen just that proven in practice in countless venues during my lengthy and varied career in wine as both a retailer and journalist and especially in teaching would-be chefs at San Francisco’s California Culinary Academy.

Getting my students to pay attention to wine was just as important as informing them about varieties, places and affinities with food. I always believed that the more one paid attention to this or that glass, not only the more one would find, but that there were certain qualities that became evident to most everyone. Watching my student’s remarkable development as thoughtful, sensitive and confident tasters over a six-week class was one of my great joys and kept me coming back to the classroom for over twenty years. True, there was a small minority that never seemed to get involved, but to argue that the interested and capable majority were so predisposed by dint of biology seems downright silly.

Now I don’t doubt that there are plenty of folks, more than not I suspect, who drink wine without much thought, and there are plenty that might think a pretty label or funny story is more important than anything else. After all, last Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle column on a wine named “Sexual Chocolate” received thirty times as many reader comments than that paper’s studied and far more serious piece on the wines of the Santa Rita Hills. The ultimate success of any of us in the business rests with the simple fact that our recommendations must make sense and carry weight with our respective audiences, and, if they do not, our voices will be ignored before long. If those of us who do, in fact, take wine seriously are “different” and are simply preaching to a deviant choir of shared phenotypes, I’m here to tell you that the choir is a very big one. I, for one, appreciate and am beholden to each and all.

* http://live.psu.edu/story/58141

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Tuesday Tributes
Suspending Rational Belief—19 Wines At 100 Points

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Let’s be clear. In my world, there is no such thing as a 100-point wine. Great wines, sure. Absolute perfection? Nope. Nineteen perfect wines? I have to suspend disbelief to even get my head around that concept.

Years ago, I and other commentators raised the question about how Mr. Robert Parker, the giver of far too many high scores, would deal with what he found to be a truly exceptional vintage when he had essentially used up all of the upper end of the 100-Point rating system. Would he, we joked, have to being to rate wines over 100-points in order to give any sense of separation among them.

The problem is this. While it is theoretically possible for many equals to exist in a scientific measure of achievement against a set of norms, wine tasting is not science, it is art. And in art, there are gradations among grand achievements. We can argue which movie or sculpture or opera is the very best. And we might even agree that there are several “very bests”. I refuse to answer the question, asked of me at public appearances, “What is the best wine you have ever tasted”?, because I have half a dozen or more answers to that question, and not just one. But I do not have 19 answers.

So, now we come to question being raised all over the wine-reading world. “Has Mr. Parker lost his way with his ratings of 19 wines from the 2009 Bordeaux vintage at 100-points?

The most lucid comments on this subject are, to my way of thinking, to be found over on the excellent blog, The Wine Diarist, written by Mike Steinberger. Steinberger is a thinker, a man of measured and fair opinions. He has a pretty good “BS” detector, but he is willing to cut Mr. Parker some slack on the subject. I wish I could be so generous, but, in order to do so, it requires me to hold my nose and suspend every sense of belief I have in the hierarchical nature of wine appreciation. Can there be nineteen wines so perfect that every one of them is better than all but a handful of the wines Mr. Parker has ever tasted?

Let's, for a moment, suspend rationality and accept the possibility that the 2009 ratings are neither a case of outrageous grade inflation nor of bad judgment.

We are then left with the notion that the 2009s are, in fact, the greatest collection of wines in the last 100 years anywhere in the world. I am all in favor of that at one level and join Mike Steinberger in suggesting that you would then have to give credit to Mr. Parker for his courageous call. He must surely know that folks would be laughing up their sleeves at him. He has been the butt of bad stories and disbelief for some years now, and he cannot have missed that anti-Parkerism is one of the big-time topics in wine commentary.

But, to get to that point of accepting my first two premises, you then have to also accept that very ripe, lush and deep wines are delicious and are the objects of perfection. I am okay with that as well. I am, after all, a writer about California wine.

You can see where I am going, of course. The 2009s, no matter how delicious they are, are not classic, tight, wait till they mature wines of the type that have been the normative standard for Bordeaux for many, many years. They may be wonderful wines but they are not classics.

In the end, we are left with a couple of lessons. The first is that Mr. Parker’s grade inflation, which we all thought could not exceed itself, has done just that. For some thirty years now, Mr. Parker’s reputation has been built upon one grand discovery after another—discoveries that have made all else that came before pale into insignificance. Even if he believed that vintage after vintage moved the bar from grand to grander and from grander to grandest, he must surely have topped himself now.

There cannot yet be another arrow in his quiver of grade inflation. And that is the problem here for Mr. Parker. No one believed he could exceed his over the top ratings of the past few years, but he has proven us wrong. Perhaps he will again. But he is going to have to break the 100-point barrier to do it.

Aside from absolute purists who will assail the 2009s as too ripe, there will be little argument that those wines taken as a whole constituted a remarkable assemblage of quality. And, it is probably unfair of those who ascribe these ratings to the destruction of Parker’s tasting acumen. I think we all know better. It is simply another in the long line of “I have found the Holy Grail” reviews that have separated Mr. Parker from the rest of us. Today’s “100” is nothing more than last year’s “98” and a decade’s ago’s “96”. But, it is not the end of wine-reviewing as we know it just because he has no place to go from here.

What this constitutes, then, simply a mistake of hubris, a loss of good judgment. Grandeur in wine is possible. Lots of grand wines from an exceptional vintage is possible. Nineteen perfect wines—more than in all the vintages that came before combined? Well, you decide. You already know how I feel.

Monday Manifestos
The Unnatural Stink Over Natural Wines

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I admit it. The more the deepening debate over natural wines goes on, the more confused I become.

As anyone who takes wine at all seriously is all too aware, there has been no shortage of fundamentalist zeal emanating from the crusaders for “natural” wines, and no clear definition as to just what the word really means. That observation, of course, is neither original nor in any way new. Maybe, it’s just me, but there has been a distinct taste of scholasticism to much of the conversation of late, and, as we have seen in the parallel and, I sometimes think, not-unrelated conflict over the “correct” levels of alcohol in wine, there has been a fair amount of derision hurled at those with opposing, or even less-than-enthusiastically supportive, views.

The battle lines are not at all clear, and, for the life of me, I do not know why there needs to be a battle, nor is it always clear just who is at the flag-waving vanguard of either side. I have wondered why is it not sufficient for a winemaker is simply say, “this is what I do and why I do it. I hope you like it”, and in so wondering I realized that I have yet to hear other than just that from winemakers themselves. I do not hear winemakers trashing one and other and citing a laundry list of their offending sins. Over the years, I have in fact found a remarkable sense of collegial respect and friendship among those in the winemaking community and little inclination to choosing up sides and the forming of cliques. No, the intractable “my way or the highway” stance that drips with oh-so-principled purity seems to be coming from somewhere else.

The rise in interest of “natural” wines has been termed a “movement,” and “movements”, it seems to me, have an abiding need for philosophical justification that separates them from the norm and imbues a certain superiority to their cause. This, I think, comes from writers, retailers, wholesalers, sommeliers and, yes, a host of bloggers, whose success is in no small part dependent on being different and “better” than others in their niche. And, you cannot have “better” without having “worse.” I sometime wonder if we look for and even invent conflicts and causes just so we can be right.

The thing about crusades and movements, however, is that they are subject to schisms, and the bigger the movement, the more likely the schism. There is after all, only so much “right” to go around. I remember a comment from Andrew Jeffords last fall when he opined in his column in Decanter magazine that “before too long, I would guess, there will be a scission in the natural wine world.” And, as reported this week in the same publication, that scission may have begun with two significant wine fairs devoted to natural wines scheduled for the same week-end in London this May. The announcement is what inspired this morning’s musings. The organizers of each claim no competition or conflict, but as sales of wines touted as being have been reported on the decline in London of late, the marketplace is first and foremost about competition.

Now, I would not for a minute argue that the debate over alcohol and what is or is not natural is pure invention, but it has gotten so out of control that I hear far less discussion about what the attributes of a given wine and more about it how adheres to one or another credo. For me, it is about what’s in the glass, about pleasure above and beyond all else. I, for one, would not refuse to drink a deep, delicious, involvingly complex wine because it was not made with indigenous yeast or was fermented in new barrels any more that I could find pleasure in a volatile, bacterially active bottle simply because it was made by a conscientious winemaker whose minimalist ethics were beyond reproach. I do not subscribe to “warts and all” school.

I still recall a fairly expensive wine that was highly recommended by a true-believing sommelier with the caveat that “if you do not know about wines, you might think it is funky.” Well, I do know about wine, and it was most assuredly funky, and its vivid memory unfortunately lingers on. Happily, I remember more clearly the remarkable 2002 Paul Hobbs Beckstoffer To Kalon Cabernet Sauvignon recently drunk with a perfectly prepared loin of lamb. I do not know how it scored on anyone’s “natural” scale, and I do not care.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Here They Go Again—Another Loony Study About Wine

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Once again, a new study about wine and the people who drink it leads me to the inevitable conclusion that there far too many statisticians and professors who simply have too much time on their hands.

The latest comes to us from Brock Univerisity in Ontario, Canada, an institution of higher learning whose mission statement reads that “we nurture both sides on the brain”. It seems that, according to research conducted by Dr. Antonia Mantonakis, associate professor of Marketing at said university, wine enthusiasts are likely to shell out more money for wines made by wineries with hard to pronounce names than those whose names are easy to say.

As reported in the Brock News *, Mantonakis, while conceding that “various things can influence the cognitive process”, says “something like the sound of a name can illicit (sic) a thought, and that thought can influence the perception of how something tastes.”

In this case, the same wine was served to subject tasters under two different names, and, when polled, the tasters apparently believed the one made by the winery with the more difficult name to be better despite the fact that the two samples turned out to be the very same wine. Further, those participants, who thorough pre-testing demonstrated a bit more wine knowledge to start, were more likely to favor the wine with the more difficult to pronounce name.

Now, I cannot quarrel with the notion that names carry weight, but the notion that there is something inherently preferable in one produced by the Tselepou Winery over one made by the more mellifluously named Titakis Winery (the two winery names employed in the “study”) does make me grin as I sit with my morning coffee.

At this point, Ms. Mantonakis’s research has concerned itself only with winery names, but we are promised further studies to see if the same holds true for the names of grape varietals as well. It could be that her yet-to-come revelations will open new vistas for those bored by Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Pinot Noir. Forget about Grüner Veltliner, Torrontes and Ribolla Giallo, their fifteen minutes of fame will have passed. Perhaps Aghiorghitiko will be the Next Big Thing, or maybe the Neagras, Babeasca or Feteasca , and watch out for Žlahtina.

All of this does get me thinking about the whole culture of wine, and it just might explain a few things; the sudden proliferation and rising celebrity status of sommeliers, for example…I mean how many people can really say “sommelier?”

Ah well, I can’t really say that I am worried. My coffee has cooled and so has my ardor. After all, the study came out of Canada.

Never mind.

* http://www.brocku.ca/brock-news/?p=14665

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Let The Name-Dropping Begin—My Wine Gods of The 1970s

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The world of wine blogging has changed. It used to be that you could write an article about the 100-point system and draw a big audience. Now, you have to drop a bunch of names, or drop one really big name. Go read those other blogs. The evidence is everywhere. And now it’s my turn.

I first time I met Louis Martini, he told me the truth. He was a gentle man, and, over the years, he told me many truths. But that first time. I met him at a Napa Valley Wine Library seminar and told him that I was about to join the industry. “What are you going to do?”, he asked, and I told him that I was about to start a wine publication. He informed me, in his kindly way, that I was about to become a writer about wine and that was not the same thing. I did not understand that then , but I do now.

Things went a little better for me when I met Ric Forman at that same seminar. Ric was then the winemaker at Sterling and one of the rising stars in the wine business. I don’t much remember what Ric taught me that day, but I do remember that he could spit a stream of wine into a bucket from five feet and not miss. I vowed then and there to learn to spit like Ric Forman. I still have the stained shirts, pants and shoes to prove that I could not do it then—and still cannot some three and a half decades hence.

Meeting Robert Mondavi was considerably more intimidating. Not his fault. Mine, I guess, but I don’t ever remember being in his presence and thinking that this was a man who was about to become a friend. People who knew Mr. Mondavi well tell me that I should have just relaxed a bit around him, but somehow, he was always Mr. Mondavi to me. Still, to this day, I recall him saying that someday the Napa Valley will be as famous as the great wine-growing areas in Europe. No need to discuss whether he was right or he was wrong, because rightfully or wrongfully, the name “Napa Valley” has become synonymous with “California” for many European wine drinkers.

I don’t blame Mr. Mondavi for the reverent, even somewhat deferential attitude that I felt in his presence, but it always struck me that I should have felt equally intimidated in the presence of Andre Tchelistcheff and I did not. Somehow, sitting with him on the porch of his house back then discussing why Pinot Noir was having such a hard time in California was not at all intimidating. Here was the finest winemaking mind of his generation, and we could have been old friends having a beer “down the local”.

It took Connoisseurs’ Guide until its third year to get around to Pinot Noir coverage back then. By that time we had done Cabernet Sauvignon four times and had already reviewed Chenin Blanc, Sylvaner and Napa Gamay. I like dropping those names if only to remember our humble beginnings. But, it does make me sad that there is simply not enough Chenin Blanc around to review any more. Somehow, Verdelho and Vermentino, also not enough around to review but getting so much play in some parts of the wine press that you might think they were the second coming of Chardonnay, just don’t allow me the same feeling of satisfaction when I drop their names.

Did I ever tell you the story about the first time I met Joe Heitz. I was walking acros the lawn at one of those Napa Wine Library shindigs they hold every August, and Mr. Heitz crossed my path going right in front of me. He looked up, gave me the finger (yes, that finger) and walked on. I asked in my astonishment, “What was that about?”, and he replied, “Aren’t you Harvey Steiman?”. I stammered, “No, I’m Charlie Olken and I just gave three stars to your 1974 Martha’s Vineyard Cab”. We became friends of sorts after that, and I was honored to be the guest writer at his annual prerelease Martha’s Vineyard tasting for several years. Since the great Gerald Asher, my favorite wine writer ever, had directly preceded me in that seat, it was an honor. I never knew if it was bestowed out of some form of embarrassment on his part, but folks told me later that Joe rarely felt embarrassed at anything.

Now, you may be wondering why I am engaged in all this name-dropping, and it is simply this. Wine-writing is, in my humble opinion, supposed to be about wine. But with every topic in the universe used up three times over by many bloggers, I find them resorting to name-dropping. It is not a practice that I think has much value, but I am happy to prove that I can name drop with the best of them. And like fine wine, I am delighted that some of those names and their stories have improved with age.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
The Serious Side of The Prowein/Low Alcohol Lunacy

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The Prowein report, that seems to call for the world to abandon ripeness as part of wine character, has led to so many silly conclusions in the press that I am forced to chuckle amidst my amazement.

It seems that 1,000 wine drinkers were polled over three continents, and that a vast majority of the several hundred Chinese wine drinkers apparently prefer wines under 12% alcohol, as did upwards of 22% of the respondents in Europe and the US. While said segments were thus cited as a “significant minority”, I am rather more struck by the apparent fact that 78% of Europeans and Americans, which seems to me a significant majority, either want higher alcohol or they find, as we have consistently championed here at CGCW, that alcohol levels are far less relevant than good balance and whether or not as the wine tastes good.

The survey results, however, are already being bandied about as further proof that, as Dan Berger writes in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, “recent research and current trends suggest that the majority of wine drinkers are happiest with wines lower in alcohol.”* Sorry Dan, maybe in China, but 22% of occidental wine consumers does not a “majority” make, no matter what your agenda may be. The “majority” in this case expressed no such preference. Do the math.

I am amused even more by the increasingly popular claim of the low-alcohol crusaders that the stunning rise in the sales of Moscato here in the US must surely mean that consumers are thirsting for less-potent wines. This, I think, might be the silliest claim of them all. I is clearly the sugar, not low alcohol that is behind the popular appeal of said wine. Moscato is the new White Zinfandel, it is Riunite 3.0 . . . . and it appears to be a marketeer’s dream. It is, as Bonny Wolf reporting for NPR charitably says “a gateway beverage for new drinkers”, and I am willing to bet that damn few of them have embraced Moscato because of its temperate alcohol. **

The Prowein report and others like it will be cited by those whose axes need grinding, but, please, folks, take a moment to reflect on their real value, not simply on how they may conveniently fit into one agenda or another. The same “study”, I might add, also found that across the world, grape variety is cited as the most important factor when buying wine. More than 80% of respondents in the UK, China and Germany – and 93% in the US – said grape variety influenced their buying decisions. If the survey is held up as proof that wine drinkers want low alcohol, then I must assume that it also “proves” that wine drinkers care little about terroir, authenticity and place.

Both conclusions, of course, seem invalid to me, yet I admit to some concern. I worry at the specious ways that “data” is used, and at the impact such sweeping conclusions might have on the decision-making processes of wineries looking to make their ways in a difficult market. We have seen the power of big-dollar marketing before, and I worry that low alcohol might become a slick selling point should the less-is-better cadre gain significantly increased traction.

I think it is fair to say that, like us, most serious wine lovers want wines of character, depth and balance, and, with the exception of great Riesling, that is simply not going to happen when alcohol percentage can be measured in single digits. I am sure, however, that there are more than a few winery CEOs that will happily respond to those who whine that they cannot drink as much as they would like without getting inebriated. Let’s see, if we lower the alcohol, these folks will drink and buy more. Seems like a simple calculus to me.

We believe that the consumer, not this or that critic, will ultimately decide what is good and what is not, be it wineries, styles of wine, individual bottlings or the opinions of those who write about it, and that the wild card of fashion always comes into play and can leave an indelible mark. The dialectic pendulum is never static, the abiding need to be “new” and “different” is a constant, and the unfortunate era of acidy, low-character “food wines” back in the 1980s as well as the more recent fascination by some with extreme, over-the-top-ripeness remind us that there are big bumps in the road from time to time when image trumps common sense.

Marketing, the popular press and the studies that drive them do, in fact, pull and push the pendulum of change, and, while evolving styles and the endless continuum of new wines and wineries keeps this business ever new and fascinating, I would simply offer the thought that change is not always change for the best.

Links:
* http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20120221/LIFESTYLE/120229930/1010/sports?Title=BERGER-A-preference-toward-lower-alcohol-wines
** http://www.npr.org/player/v2/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=146000345&m=146051998
** http://www.npr.org/2012/01/29/146000345/moscato-madness-the-dessert-wines-sweet-surge

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Tuesday Tributes
The Low Alcohol Craze Goes Overboard

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Something has to give. The newfound lust for low alcohol wines is about to destroy the wine business as we know it.

A recent study out of Germany, looking at consumer preferences around the globe, has uncovered the most bothersome of truths. People want wine to be less than 12% alcohol. This would not be such a bad thing if it were possible to make our favorite wines at that reduced level and still deliver full and balanced flavors.

Who would not want rich, layered Cabernets or supple, silky, nuanced Pinot Noirs with low alcohols? Bring me the flavor, bring me the texture, bring me the balance, bring me the sympathetic partnership with great meals, or even with hamburgers, and I will join the amen chorus in a heartbeat. But there is a reason why our favorite wines do not exist at 10.5% to 12% alcohol. The do not taste as good at those levels. It is simply a matter of fact. One cannot find any grand Pinot or Cabernet or Chardonnay or Zinfandel at those kinds of alcohol levels.

People want lower alcohol so they can drink more. I get that. I like low-alcohol ciders when I am in Normandy. I like most beers and ales because they are closer to 5% than 10% and one can take a healthy mouthful to wash down that pizza or lamb vindaloo or kung pao prawn. So why would I not want a 5% alcohol Cabernet that was rich, deep and balanced and was still a perfect accompaniment to a standing rib roast? In point of fact, I do. We all do.

The late Louis Martini, in the very first interview I ever did after starting Connoisseurs’ Guide back in the dark ages, put it this way, “I love wine. I don’t like alcohol. The perfect wine would be one that had no alcohol at all. So far that wine does not exist”. He went on to explain that alcohol limited the amount of wine he could drink and also the amount of wine that he could sell.

But Mr. Martini knew better, and if you look into your heart of hearts, you know better as well. The same survey that says Americans want alcohols under 12% and that says the Chinese want alcohols closer to 10% also reflects this contradictory fact. The two favorite varieties in both countries are Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. If ever there were varieties that simply cannot, in today’s world, produce high quality wines at those low alcohol levels, those two must stand near the top of the list.

It is unfortunate, but it is time to admit that our brains tell us one thing and our palates tell us another. And sadly, we cannot have it both ways. We cannot drink our favorite tipples in unlimited amounts. Wine just does not work that way.

So, until the world invents a better grape or a useful yeast that ferments great wines at less than the normal conversion ratios or technology that will reduce alcohol without changing body, flavor or balance, we are stuck with that great bugaboo we call moderation. Sorry about that winelovers, but someone needs to tell you the truth. Now, perhaps we can get back to drinking great wine in whatever amounts our bodies and the law will allow. It is the price we pay for being winelovers.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Waiting for Sauvignon Blanc

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Sauvignon Blanc, I think, gets nowhere near the respect that it should. It almost never knocks down big scores in the wine press and is too often dismissed condescendingly as a wine of inherently limited reach. It has received its fair share of derisive critical snorts, and it has been largely ignored lately as one after another writer seeks to claim a few minutes of fame for the discovery of the next new “great” white varietal be it Grillo, Ribolla Gialla, Verdelho, Grenache Blanc, et al.

Well, I may be out of step with fashion, but I happen to like Sauvignon Blanc. Good Sauvignon Blanc, of course, and I would not argue with those who would remind that there is lots of lesser stuff to be had. Well-made Sauvignon Blanc is a versatile, food-friendly wine that is a staple for us. Its step is lighter and its gait livelier than that of Chardonnay, and it is an eminently versatile, food-friendly wine. The best examples, however, be they top-flight Sancerres and Pouilly Fumes, the brilliant bottlings of the Graves or local versions from the likes of Robert Mondavi, Grgich Hills or Merry Edwards can offer much more.

There is another aspect to fine Sauvignon that rarely gets mentioned, and that is its ability to age. On more than one occasion, we have been pleasantly surprised at not only by the remarkable staying power of well-cellared Sauvignon Blanc, but by the complexity and depth of character that it can reveal with time. Just last night, we opened a bottle of the 2006 Chalk Hill Winery as a foil to a quickly sautéed Sockeye Salmon fillet, and found ourselves exchanging sudden glances of surprise and delight at just how good the wine had become. Now, six years may not seem all that old, but when Sauvignon Blanc is discussed, it is almost never talked about as having more than a couple of years of potential, and, in the case, the wine was layered, vibrant and vital and was nowhere near to reaching the end of its life.

We have routinely found that examples from the afore-mentioned Grgich Hills can develop famously for a decade or more, and, in fact, some such as the winery’s latest Essence are wines that simply demand age. We still recall that when, as a bit of a lark, we pulled the cork on the 1976 Joseph Phelps at our millennial New Year’s dinner, it proved at 24-years-old to be the wholly unexpected star of the evening’s appropriately prestigious line-up of white wines.

Because of tasting thousands of new-release wines annually, I confess to having developed a fondness for young and gregariously fruity wines, but every so often, when opportunity admits, it is nice to be reminded of the virtues that only patient aging can bring to very good wine. In yesterday’s post, we led with the observation that “there is a reason why people should cellar ageworthy wines, and it’s so simple. They get better with time in the bottle.” Anyone who has enjoyed a fine older wine knows that to be true, and I would remind that it is not only the sturdy reds such as Cabernet and Syrah that have the potential to grow.

I would not make the claim that the majority of the world’s Sauvignon Blancs are worthy candidates for the cellar, quite the contrary, but experience teaches that the structured and serious ones are. Sometimes real pleasure awaits in the most unlikely places.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
You Say Older Wines Are Trouble—I Say “Poppycock”

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There is a reason why people should cellar ageworthy wines, and it’s so simple. They get better with time in the bottle.

What could be easier to understand than that? Yet here is a decidedly misleading comment from a writer who must surely know better. Writing in Bloomberg News, John Mariani comments, as if the problem were an everyday occurrence, “The trouble with old wines, even if kept in temperature- and humidity-controlled conditions in a million dollar cellar, is that they can go bad, oxidize or simply not taste very good after years of aging”.

And as part of his proof, and the only concrete example offered, he quotes the sommelier at New York City’s La Grenouille Restaurant, "We actually encourage them to try a younger, less expensive wine more conducive to the meal rather than go for the 1998 Haut-Brion."

Here is the problem with that proposition. Aside from the fact that La Grenouille has marked the wine up to impossibly pricey levels, the wine itself is just now reaching its peak drinkability. That is the nature of Cabernet Sauvignon-based wines. The better ones, and Haut Brion is one of those, take a decade just to shed themselves of their baby fat and to acquire the beginnings of the complex patina of age. Paul Draper of Ridge Vineyards, who knows a thing or two about the subject, insists that Cabernet Sauvignon does not really start to show itself until it has reached its twelfth birthday.

At Connoisseurs’ Guide, we have the proof that he is right. We have, since our first days, held back bottles from good Cabernet vintages. The first of our longitudinal studies involved the Cabernets of the 1970. Back then, there was a legitimate question to be asked if California Cabs could age as long as their French counterparts. There were, of course, some very fine examples of older California wines holding up quite well, but it would be fair to say that those few vintages of Beaulieu and Inglenook and the occasional Krug and Louis Martini were the exceptions to the general experience.

All that changed here in the late 1960 and early 1970s when the treatment of Cabernet Sauvignon became more modernized both at existing wineries and especially for newcomers like Heitz, Chappellet, Robert Mondavi and Ridge in the early part of that period and then the wave of folks like Caymus, Chateau Montelena, Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, Diamond Creek and many more just years later. We now know that those wines have aged for two decades and more.

And we know that their French counterparts have been aging for the same extended periods for decades and decades before we here in California caught on. So, why the worry wart warblings quoted above? Regardless of the fact that aging wine is always a bit of a crapshoot and comes with no guarantees of success for every bottle, those suggestions that there is reason to worry about wines barely more than a decade old are belied by the majority of wines that we and other knowledgeable commentators have recommended as ageworthy. We do not make this stuff up out of whole cloth. We have the probabilities on our sides because we have tasted old wines for years now and we know better.

I have no million-dollar cellar. Mine is constructed out of two by fours and plywood. It certainly contains some wines that are losing their grip on life. Those 1970 California Cabernets, now over forty years old, are getting tired. I sometimes have to open a second bottle to find one worthy of the patience it has been afforded. But what the heck? Those wines cost me $8 and some electricity. And when a great wine or two comes my way, as a 1970 Beaulieu Georges de Latour Private Reserve and a 1974 Heitz Martha’s Vineyard did not so long ago, then I know that Bloomberg must be pulling my leg—or needs to taste more older wines.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
A Love Letter To Syrah

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Happy Valentine’s Day, Syrah. I Love You.

I know that those bullies, Pinot Noir and Riesling are throwing stick and stones at you. I know that those bags of acid that make Chardonnay so palatable to folks with a taste for lemonade are threatening to change your complexion as well. I understand that a bunch of namby-pambies who cannot drink anything with alcohol in it now revel in their Txakolis and Ribolla Giallas. I don’t care.

I love your lush, plump physique. I luxuriate in your richness. I grow dreamy just thinking of the intellectual challenge presented by your complex personality. You remind me of why I also love Zinfandel—you are no wimp. You have character. You have depth. And yes, when your pure fruitiness caresses my lips alongside a savory leg of lamb or a Provençal-seasoned stuffed chicken thigh simmered long in a wine and mushroom bath, I am transported to vinous heaven. Yes, Syrah, I worship you.

Why is it, I wonder, that so few folks agree? You are not an “acquired taste” like orange wines or Gruner Veltliner. You are mainstream. You make thousands and thousands of people all over the world happy with your intense fruit and gamy, meaty, sometime herb-scented complexities. You can be tight and worthy of long cellaring, and you can be open, delicious and bold. And that is just in your native France where somehow winelovers understand.

There are wonderful tasty Syrahs being made from Santa Barbara to Walla Walla and almost every place in between. Yet, Syrah, the fickleness populace on these shores has abandoned you. Oh well, all’s the better for those who have discovered the new releases from folks like JC Cellars, DuMOL, The Ojai Vineyard and Shafer, from Betz and Testarossa.

Hang in there, Syrah. Popularity tends to run in short bursts these days. Man cannot live by Napa Valley Cabernet, Dry Creek Zinfandel and Russian River Pinot Noir alone. Your offspring, Petite Sirah, has found new lovers and so will you.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
I Say 95 Points—You Say “Amen”

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There is a reason why people like the wines of Romanee-Conti, and it is not because of point scores. We all say “Amen” to great wine because we recognize it as great.

The nature and worth of expertise is regular grist for the mill of the wine blogoshere, and, while more often than not often the bête noire of the Hosemaster’s poodles*, the notion of expertise is occasionally discussed with a bit of thought and sense.

The topic was obliquely revisited earlier this week by Matt Kramer in his declaration that the biggest, most damnable lie about wine is that a wine’s quality is simply based on an individual’s subjective likes and dislikes; that, as he says, “if you like it, it’s good”. Ah yes, back to the belief that beauty lies solely in the eye of the beholder and the drone of those whose appreciation of wine begins and ends with the claim that all you need is a trust in your own palate. No sir, there ain’t no elitists here.

Now, I share Matt’s consternation on several levels, but to call the idea that “if you like it, it’s good” the greatest lie about wine is going a little too far. I understand that the calculus of making wine easy and accessible is good for the business, and anything that makes people more comfortable in the confounding world of wine is alright by me. Insofar as we are talking about the casual wine drinker or the tyro just starting out, a simple up or down vote depending on an uncritical gulp is just fine. Why bother to understand or know why you happen to like this or that wine when simply liking it is enough? I for one am glad for this kind of populism that invites new folks to the market.

But, I would make the case that fine wine like fine food and a good many of life’s finer things is an acquired taste. At some point the notion of what is “good” changes and arguably becomes less dependent on each and every individual taster.

I do not happen to think that experience and education makes one elitist. No, they are the path to expertise. They make us discerning and more attuned to the details and small differences that make fine wine from one to the next so utterly unique and involving. The devil is not in the details, the real pleasure is. Curiosity, discovery and the sharp eye -- or palate -- to make it, is what true expertise and connoisseurship is about.

Oh, there are those with money to burn who will gulp down Grand Crus because of an abiding need to consume only the best, but do they know the difference between Margaux, Coonawara and Napa? Do they care? No more, I suspect, than the on-and-off-again imbiber looking at the grocery store shelf for a $8.00 bottle of Merlot. I do have the sense, however, by what I see and hear every day that there are a whole lot of people who do, and they are the next generation of real connoisseurs.

We now live in a world of infinitely available information. The drive to know has accordingly increased with the means to do so. To be sure, the internet has spawned plenty of mindless electronic blather, but it also compels us all to being permanent students, and, as the number of serious students of wine must surely increase, the idea that “good” is relative will become a tougher sell.

I think that Mr. Kramer’s “biggest lie” is on its way to becoming a bit smaller.

* please see http://www.hosemasterofwine.blogspot.com/2012/02/quiddick-critic.html

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
New Plantings—An Opinionated Analysis

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Recent reports on new plantings, while positive in the aggregate, offer no happiness for drinkers and collectors of higher priced, coastally grown wines.

Let’s begin with the positive. In 2011, after several lean years, plantings increased across California by about 4%. Because plantings respond to shortages, both real and anticipated in grape supplies, this uptick in plantings has to be viewed as good for the industry as a whole. But, when one looks behind the numbers, several less than desirable data points stick out for the expensive end of the market.

Most of the new plantings were focused on warmer, high production locations in the Central Valley. While the added attention to Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir in that region does mean that we will see an increase in less expensive versions of those highly regarded varieties, it also means that lower levels of plantings have occurred in coastal vineyards. With wine sales on the upswing and tight and less than stellar vintages hitting the market and waiting in the wineries, it will mean somewhat leaner times for collectors. It will also mean that price pressure will be pushing up from the bottom, and prices are now more likely to rise than they have been for a few years.

One takeaway from this story needs to be that collectors will do better pricewise in the next year than beyond, but, that given the mixed quality of the vintages, selectivity will be more essential. The second takeaway is that Pinot Noir, being an early ripening variety, is going to be more consistent than other varieties. 2009 has turned out to be a very good year for Pinot, and despite the inevitable disasters for some vineyards and wineries in 2011, Pinot should come through in that vintage as well.

Cabernet Sauvignon is likely to be a somewhat different story if only because it requires longer hang times than Pinot. Regardless of the many stories about successful vineyard results that have extended into November and stayed in good health, it is also true that there is a cross-current of stories about grapes that simply did not get picked. And while November harvests can work out—witness 1998 which was written off in some quarters but still produced some very good wines, it is also the fact that grapes that achieve needed sugar levels through dehydration rather than vine-ripening are rarely the producers of greatness.

“Greatness” may not be a matter of concern for the largest percentage of wine drinkers who want clean, easy to like wines and whose roles in keeping the industry healthy are essential, but it is central to the expensive end of the wine world. Rising demand and even modestly limited production in “fancy” wine are likely to work together against the interests of those of us who want greatness but do not want to pay over the odds for it. It is bad enough that $40 to $60 has become the entry price for very high quality Pinots and Cabernets and is trending that way in Chardonnay as well. For our sakes and for the sakes of consumers, we can hope that $75 will not become the new $50. We saw rises of that nature happen almost overnight in the mid-90s and then thankfully slow down. The potential for rapid price rise is now in the cards, and we all need to keep a weather eye out for the return of boom times in wine and grape pricing. We are dealing with an agricultural commodity when one gets right down to it.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestoes
The Horror of Terroir

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Blame The French for the unprovable notion that terroir is king above all else.

I have long held that Pinot Noir is, among red varietals, the grape that most keenly reflects its terroir. I still believe it. I am beginning to question, however, if that is necessarily a good thing, and I am struggling with the question of whether a wine’s first duty is to speak to its place or to taste good. Heresy in some quarters, I know, but I do not always find that the two are mutually inclusive.

There are those committed terroirists who would argue that a wine’s sense of place is the absolute requisite of any real vinous success, and, while I would not disagree that there are truly great vineyard sites whose wines can achieve transcendent beauty, I do not believe that every vineyard and every block within it has something to say that is worth listening to. Merely having a voice does not make one a singer.

The catalyst for my morning crankiness is not some new manifesto from those who would tell us what is true and authentic. It is instead a gnawing sense that artful blending is too often ignored in the new culture of California Pinot Noir.

The proliferation of single-site Pinots is clearly on the upswing hereabouts, and sometimes I am left scratching my head as I taste my way through ten or twelve different bottlings from one winery and questioning the point. While far from being a universal occurrence, it is not uncommon that a winery’s simple appellation bottling turns out to be more attractive than its vineyard designates. The latter are invariably more expensive, and the message is clear that they must therefore be better, but is that really borne out by what is in the bottle? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

France, I would argue, is still the standard by which great wines are measured, and, to some extent, I suppose, one can blame the persistent Burgundian mindset that values individual “crus” and “climats” above all else. There are reasons enough for doing so, but the justifiably revered sites of the Côte d’Or have demonstrated quality and distinction over generations of competition and comparison with their neighbors, and their prestige and prices are not based on winemaker whim.

In time, the market will decide which of the new California venues do and do not deserve fame and high prices, but I suspect that we will see an expanding roster of single-vineyard bottlings in the years before that happens. In the meantime, I hope that winemakers and wine lovers do not fall into the trap of blindly believing that those Pinots that identify a particular plot are inherently superior to those that do not. Place is important, but so is the winemaker’s craft.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
All The News That Fits We Spit

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Sometimes the wine news is more alarming than the Republican primaries. Here are the latest bits of strangeness than have caught my attention.

ITEM: Paul Dolan Ousted

It was forty years and then some that Barney Fetzer decided to join the ranks of those wealthy individuals who were called to winemaking. Perhaps because he was not in the Napa Valley, we do not often speak of him and the empire he created as being part of the first wave of new wineries in the 1970 era. But there he was, before Caymus, before Clos Du Val, before Chateau Montelena. And, as we know, over the years, his small fledgling effort became a large, full-service winery. Along the way, Paul Dolan entered the picture, first as winemaker and then as family member when he married a Fetzer daughter. His influence helped the winery grow into the entity that then was purchased for mucho dinero by Brown-Forman. In time, all the Fetzers departed, of course and the brand lost its cache. But Dolan, and another set of partners went off and purchased the Parducci winery from the family and were running it, for better or worse, as a value brand. Now comes word that Dolan has been forcibly removed from Parducci in some kind of coup that led to the constabulary being called and his name and image rather abruptly being removed from the winery website and listings.

Now, all of this would be small beer in a world in which candidates for the Presidency call each other “despicable” save for the fact that this is our world, our everyday world, and Paul Dolan is a good man with the vision to create brands and to lead the way in modern viticulture. Dolan will wind up on his feet. He is smart, agile and connected. But this incident reminds us that is “people”, not machines who make wine.

ITEM: “Wine Producers Campaign For Truth In Labeling”

I saw this headline and started cheering. Surely, it meant that the wineries were going to start making alcohol statements more accurate, easier to find on wine labels and easier to read when found. The other night, we had a bottle of Peju Cabernet in which the government-mandated alcohol statement was printed in dark red on black, sideways, on textured paper and in tiny print. A roomful of wine writers and winemakers, having tasted the wine blind, could not read the statement with or without our glasses on.

But, no such luck. The article was all about how to protect the Napa name and why American producers of sparkling wine are still using the geographic term “Champagne” on their labels. Now, I am all for protecting Napa’s good name, but then, too, am I also all for protecting Champagne’s good name. What I don’t get is why some Americans in the wine biz think they can have it both ways. And, of course, I am still cheesed off that they want to have their cake and eat it too on wine labels but too many of them do not think that consumers are entitled to truth in labeling.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
It Hurts To Tell The Truth

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The story you are about to hear is based on a real incident. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I was in attendance at the ZAP Festival tasting over the weekend. Had a great time. Finally used Twitter for what it was invented—chirping endlessly about very little yet being read by the masses in attendance. Well, perhaps “very little” is a bit harsh, because the reports of wines tasted and people interviewed did at least bring a very “live” aspect to my tweets. Normally, I tweet little tidbits of facts just for the fun of it. On Saturday, it was a running commentary. It was radio with a keyboard substituted for a microphone. But, that is not the whole story—and certainly not the juicy part of the story. For that I have to protect my sources. Winery owners can be prickly sorts. You do not want to cross them because they can react in not very nice ways. See Steve Heimoff’s blog about the problems that can arise and my comments therein.

So, when I had a chat with a winery principal about a Zinfandel I did not like recently, it did not go all that well. I never like those kinds of confrontations, but they do go with the territory. If one is going to say unkind things when necessary about someone’s creations, one has to expect that some of those creators are going to take exception.

Later in the day, the “truth” came out. The winemaker, who is not part of ownership, dropped by the Connoisseurs’ Guide table for a chat and confessed that the wine in question had suffered from “smoke taint” and the winery had gone to great lengths to clean it up. Quoth he, “It did lose a little in the process. I think you will find the 2010 to be back in form”.

I wish I could tell you the name of the winery and the wine, but the innocent must be protected. The review, of course, is now verified by the hands-on maker, and that is the key fact. I may not be able to tell you the names of the folks involved, but the review in our January issue is confirmed to be accurate. The truth does hurt at times, but it did come out in blind tasting—always the best way to get at the truth. Perhaps that is the moral of the story. The truth hurts but it will out in the end.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Zinfandel Love Does Not Get Better Than This

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Connoisseurs’ Guide

There is a new venue, a new look and a new feel to this year’s Zinfandel Festival, and, if Day One is any indication of what is to come, this year’s event may prove to be the best yet.

We will also be reporting on the giant tasting tomorrow. Look for live tweets every half hour starting at 1030 with comments about wines to taste and possible hidden gems. Go to @charlieolken and follow along.

The Zinfandel Advocates and Producer’s (ZAP) annual extravaganza has traditionally started with an informal walk-around evening of tasting and eating wherein various restaurateurs, caterers and chefs are teamed with noteworthy Zinfandel producers to come up with a winning food and wine match. Formerly called “Zinfandel and Good Eats”, the gathering now goes by the name “Epicuria”, and the evening just finished earns a tip of the CGCW hat.

As long-time ZAP supporters and sponsors, we never miss this night of nibbles and wine, yet good intensions and effort duly noted, some years have been better than others. Last night, however, the bar of achievement was raised to new heights, and, if fairly reluctant to get too excited lest our comments take on a “too bad you weren’t there” tone, we nonetheless think a bit of applause is in order.

We simply cannot recall a previous incarnation of Epicuria, nee Good Eats, wherein the featured dishes showed as much success in both concept and execution across the broad. We were particularly struck by the former insofar as participant chefs, with very few exceptions, really seemed to grasp just what the varietal was about and embraced the idea that, while delicious with the usual tomatoey pastas and barbecued pork, Zinfandel can make transcendent drinking with a spectacular range of foods. That was a message missed by none in attendance.

Now, I do confess that we did not/could not try every one of the more than fifty dishes on the menu, but particularly worthy of note and universally successful with all but the most alcoholic, over-the-top wines (of which there were mercifully few) was a bite of Braised Lamb shoulder with Black Pepper Spaetzle, Burnt Orange and White Anchovy Salsa Verde from Wayfare Tavern, the Braised Pork Sliders from Equus, the Pork Rillette Crostini w/ Zinfandel and Onion Jam prepared by Bin 38, and A16’s Duck Terrine with Pickled Huckleberry and Pistacios. Le Truc checked in with a terrific Pan-seared Pork Belly with a Zinfandel-Cracked-Pepper Glaze and Mardi Gras Slaw, and small Cochinita Pibil Tacos filled with slow-roasted pork flavored with sweet-and-sour achiote paste and baked on banana leafs was an altogether surprising hit with the softer, less acidy Zins. There was a Duck Chili and spicy Bahn Mi sandwiches that found fine affinity with the honoree of the night, and a sublime Truffled Ricotta Ravioli from Rose Pistola was an astonishingly perfect foil to Storybook Mountian Vineyard’s 2009 Eastern Exposures. And, while not formally paired up at the same table, the roasted-lamb lollipops offered up by Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse were nothing short of perfection with the altogether stunning 2004 Ravenswood Old Hill Ranch Zinfandel poured by winemaker Joel Peterson.

Again, while meant to give credit where credit is due, this recitation of a marvelous menu is less about critical review and meant more as a celebration of Zinfandel’s extraordinary ability to marry with such a wide range of foods, from rustic to sophisticated, from complex to simple.

We like well-made Zinfandel...always have, and we cannot seem to get enough of it. You will find us at ZAP’s Grand Tasting this Saturday, and if you happen to be there too, please drop by our table and say hello. If this year’s gathering is not on your calendar, you might want to start making plans for next January. And remember to follow us on Twitter. Just click the button:

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Thursday Thorns
Celebrate Zinfandel Week With These Remarkable Best Buys

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Connoisseurs’ Guide to California Wine

Zinfandel may get the starring role in these parts this week, but around the CGCW family table, it has been an important player for a very long time.

On Tuesday, we waxed on Zinfandel’s remarkable affinity to the kinds of hearty foods that we so like to cook on a regular basis – tomatoey pastas, barbecued meats, savory stews and the like – and I can only offer a very loud amen to his sentiments, so long as we understand that we are not talking about the pruney, port-like, ultra-ripe, late-harvest monsters that have too often been seen as the varietal standard bearers over the last decade or so. No, we mean the spicy, brightly balanced, berry-like versions that once were the norm. Once upon a time, Zinfandel ranked among the very best red-wine values to be had as well, yet, as the wines began to heat up, those that delivered the right kind of bang for the buck became increasingly hard to find. Fans of old-fashioned, affordable, food-worthy Zinfandels were left with fewer and fewer options as the varietal went through a thorny patch. Today, it is easy to make the case that Zinfandel is back.

There may, in fact, be no shortage of high-ticket, high-alcohol bottlings to be had, but even a cursory tasting of recent new wines offers encouragement to those of us who would have a glass or two of Zinfandel with a meal. It may be that the series of cooler vintages hereabouts has had something to do with reining in runaway ripeness, and it may be that winemaker sensibility is at work. It is in all likelihood both. Significant, too, is the number of good wines to be had at reasonable prices, and that trend most assuredly cannot be blamed on global warming, rainy harvests, the weakening Euro or anything else other than a responsive market.

Featured today are eight recently reviewed Zinfandels that hit both of the right marks. They are honest, tasty, well-balanced wines that will be welcome at the table, and they collectively prove that very good bottlings are to be had for less than a couple of sawbucks. We think that it is about time.

89 DOWNING FAMILY Fly by Night Oakville Napa Valley 2008 $17.00
Distinctive top notes of nutmeg, vanilla and briar are met by a good measure of well-defined, optimally ripened Zinfandel fruit in the nose here, yet the wine seems to let up a bit in the mouth and, while pleasant, is never quite as deep and complete as billed. It is, however, supple and nicely polished in feel, and its lack of angles, edges and heat makes it an easy Zin to marry with food.

89 TRENTADUE Estate Alexander Valley 2009 $15.00
True to Zinfandel in its berries-first focus and pushing notes of brownies and caramel to the rear in a supportive role, this ripe, rich effort is fairly open at the front of the palate and supple on its texture. Rich, juicy and ripe in flavor with latter-palate tannin coming into play, the wine could smooth out with a bit of aging, but it has so much direct energy right now that we would opt to serve it with savory red-sauced pastas or barbecue today.

88 STEELE Old Vine Pacini Vineyard Mendocino County 2007 $17.00
Bound to recall the "good old days" for long-time fans of Zinfandel, this nicely balanced middleweight is damped-down in ripeness and keyed on lively young fruit. It is rounded in feel yet finds a welcome note of snappy acidity on the back end, and its temperate alcohol (13.5%) makes it easy to match up with a fairly wide range of foods.

88 BUCKLIN Old Hill Ranch Bambino Sonoma Valley 2008 $18.00
Born of younger vines planted in the storied Old Hill Ranch, this ripe and sinewy take on Zinfandel smacks of raspberries, stony soils and a hint of peppery spice in both scent and taste. Its nominal tannins are driven to prominence by fairly obvious acids, and it winds up more rigid than rounded, but it is deep and should age very well. Baby Old Hill, indeed.

87 CASTLE ROCK Mendocino County 2009 $12.00
Kudos to Castle Rock for this oh-so easy-to-like, medium-bodied Zinfandel whose nicely ripened berryish aromas are geared first and foremost to youthful, friendly varietal fruit. Somewhat round and open on the palate with more than enough acidity to carry its flavors into a mid-length, fairly zesty finish, this wine is perfect for red-sauced pastas and lighter meats hot off the grill.

87 FRANCIS COPPOLA Zinfandel California 2009 $16.00
There is no breathtaking range or richness to be had here, but there is a nice bit of clean-as-can-be Zinfandel fruit, and, when combined with the wine's friendly balance and wholesale lack of heat, it earns this temperate, very easy-to-use offering an unqualified recommendation. The wine is ready to go now yet is balanced to keep, and it comes at a very fair price.

87 RAVENSWOOD Zinfandel Lodi 2009 $13.00
The best of the three large-production Ravenswood Zins, this one from Lodi keys on ripe berries and plums from beginning to end and is both balanced and fairly substantial in real varietal fruit. It may not compete with the winery's best when it comes to depth and layered richness, but it is an honest and thoroughly likeable Zinfandel with very few rivals at the price.

85 CARTLIDGE & BROWNE Zinfandel Sonoma County 2009 $10.00
It gets a bit overwhelmed when directly compared to the high-ripeness crowd, but this rounded, pleasantly balanced wine has a good sense of real Zinfandel fruit at its heart, and it does not give in tannin or heat. It may not be the deepest version around and it tends to dry out a little at the finish, but it is both friendly and food-worthy. It is a very likeable wine at the price.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Zinfandel Stands Tall—Especially This Week

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

No other grape, not even the finest Cabernets and Pinots, inspires me to get out in the kitchen and rattle those pots and pans as much as Zinfandel does. The Olkens just love the foods that goes with Zin . They are so tasty, so comfortable, so satisfying.

No truffles, no long-simmered wine sauces, no fois gras. Those are not Zinfandel food. They are for those other fancy pants varieties. Zinfandel is about food for the soul, food for the heart, food taken for the gusto. It almost makes me want to toss out the Riedels and drink it out of Mason jars. But, of course, I don’t because a good wine glass is the way to drink good wine—and good Zinfandel is more than just good wine. It is good wine with a personality that wants nothing more of its fans than a good sniff and plate of something savory.

And it just so happens that this is Zinfandel Week in San Francisco. This is the week that hundreds of wineries and thousands of wine lovers convene for no other reason than they too are full-on aficionados of the grape. They come from all over the country to sample Zin with food and to explore newly released Zinfandels by the hundreds at the ZAP (Zinfandel Advocates and Producers) festival starting on Thursday evening.

That is the night when you can drink Zinfandel with wonderfully matched food for hours on end at the event called ZINFANDEL AND GOOD EATS. We will be there, and not just because we have a booth so we can meet and greet. We will have folks scurrying around the floor seeking out a meatball here and bruschetta there, a lamb stew here and a selection of rillettes there. It is an extravaganza of Zinfandel tastes from dozens of top producers and bites from well-known restaurants, that, in some years at least, have come in from all over the country.

There is a Friday night fancy, sit-down dinner for the truly committed who will pony up a king’s ransom to sit for an evening with the royalty of Zinfandel. Every table will have top producers sitting in. Tickets for this event are limited and they go fast. Call ZAP today if you want a place at the table. You can also visit the website, www.zinfandel.org , for complete information and for discounted tickets for each of the events.

Then on Saturday afternoon comes the Grand Tasting. Something like 300 wineries fill the space at The Concourse in downtown San Francisco to pour their latest Zins. And, if truth be told, some of them will have a little extra to share. You never know when an older vintage or a spicy Zin-Syrah blend will emerge from under the table if you show enough interest. Our booth will be on the main floor, somewhere in the middle. Come on down and say hello. And bring your Zin palate along.

This year, if we can get our computers to cooperate, we will be Tweeting about interesting Zins we have tasted. Visit @charlieolken for updates starting at 11 AM and updated throughout the day.

Zinfandel Week is here, and there is nothing like a good Zin to lift our moods this week.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
There Is Always A Wine Angle

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I was stuck in traffic on the way out of the 49ers game yesterday trying to explain to my seatmate how the team needs to mature before it becomes great. And, then it hit me. The wine angle.

For any sports team to be great, it needs vision and leadership, it needs great materials and it needs superb execution. My friend, who is no wine expert but is a wine lover and does not hesitate to spend in the $40 to $100 range from time to time, was struggling to find an appropriate analogy that would explain how it was that our team had crashed to defeat when victory was within its grasp.

The wine angle was the answer. It is not the only answer, and it is obviously a bit of a stretch, but besides our love of sports, we share wine passion and so we explored, because we needed something for our wounded pride, the wine angle.

Why is it, we asked ourselves, that wineries using the same grapes, located in the same neighborhoods, come up with such different results. Our first and best answer, we decided, was vision. Even more important than great grapes, comes the absolute necessary to know what one wants to do and why. Not just as a goal. We all have goals, dreams, hopes. No, by vision, we meant knowing the path, seeing the way, having the clarity to get on that right path. Clearly, that is what happened to the 49ers this year. The team went from a coach who frankly could not find the path to greatness to a coach whose ability to lead has to be among the best there is. As kids we used to have an expression about folks who could not reason effectively. We used to say of them, “He would not recognize the tune if it hit him in the mouthpiece”.

It is not unkind to say that there are wineries and winemakers who sometimes do not recognize the tune. They simply cannot find their ways, and, as the result, their efforts underachieve relative to their peers using the same fruit. This year, the 49ers, in Jim Harbaugh, were led by a man who not only knows the tune but can improvise around it, can script scores for fifty musicians who then play above their heads because the vision and leadership is so good.

But, then, what of materials? In the wine biz, we are fond of saying, “you can’t make great wine without great grapes”. Nobody is going to argue that proposition. No matter how one slices it, no matter what rhetorical tricks one employs, it is a truism that the best wines are made from the best grapes. But, then, how to explain why some wineries do better jobs with grapes from such fine sites as To Kalon or Keefer Ranch or Garys’ Vineyard? The answer in the first place is vision. And in the second, then is talent.

At that point, we wandered around the materials versus talent equation with the 49ers and came up with dashes of both because they are interrelated. So, leaving football aside for the moment, we next come to the winemaker. It is true that the very best winemakers bring their own visions to the table. They are the Joe Montanas, the Bret Favres, the Johnny Unitas’ of the wine world. Their skills translate the vision and the materials into the finished product. The best of them add that extra bit of spice, seasoning, mastery that separates the very good from the exceptional.

In wine, those people are the Andre Tchellistcheffs, the Robert Mondavis, the Aubert Du Villaines. They are the folks who do it year in and year out and across many vineyards and grapes. The 49ers, we concluded for the umpteenth time since the loss of the Joe Montana/Steve Young “winemakers”, do not have such a person. A good man in Alex Smith, yes, but yesterday, Eli Manning of the New York Giants taught us a lesson about leadership and the Giants’ wide receivers taught us a lesson about the talent that is needed in the whole team.

One of the “excuses”, although I like to call it “analyses” one will hear is the relative lack of maturity in the 49ers. It does take time in any profession for “wisdom” to develop. We see that need all the time in winewriting, and it is obviously true in winemaking and in football. And, with that final bit of “analysis” in place, we concluded that the 49ers will be better next year. In football, as in wine, there is always next year.

Maybe, those thoughts were not so profound after all, but they did, at least give us some solace in the two hours it took to exit the stadium and wend our ways home. Yesterday, we worked the theory out as it applies to football. Tonight, we will apply it to a group of Cabernet Sauvignons.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Sommeliers Vs. Bloggers—The Battle To Replace Mr. Parker

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

A couple of years ago, it was the bloggers who were going to take over. Recently, the new word is that it will be the Sommeliers. I know the answer.

It will be none of the above. Wine journalism is going to evolve going forward, but there will always be plenty of room for expert opinion. The suggestion that the wine-drinking world is now so well-educated in this country that it no longer needs expert journalism is belied by the experiences in Europe where wine drinking is established and so are wine experts and where paid for publications continue to thrive.

My own view is that the newsletter as we know it—whether CGCW or Parker’s Wine Advocate—will evolve into something that is much more “electronic” with both written opinion by a staff of experts and lots of reader involvement. Something that crosses the divide between the so-called agglomeration sites like Snooth and Cellar Tracker and the newsletters. As for the glossy mags, it will be a long-time before we see the devolution of the Wine Spectator or the Wine Enthusiast. Those folks rely on advertising for their business model, and because they serve such a high-income, big-time consumption set of readers, they will be able to maintain themselves through their formulas of low subscription costs and ad revenues. And look out you bloggers and sommeliers and agglomeration sites because the financial health of the existing publications makes them the best bet to be the last man standing years from now.

What is less clear is how the Internet will evolve. Blogging is already different from what it was just a few short years ago. There may not have been a great falloff in the number of blogs, but there are cracks in the base caused by the lack of reward for all the hard work that goes into writing. Even those bloggers whose expertise platform is lacking (sorry for the snobbish note here, but it does take time to become professional at any trade or craft), and for whom blogging is a spare time, non-commercial event, don’t like putting thousands of words into the ether and not having much readership to show for it. A blog is not a personal diary. It is a piece of work offered to others. It takes time and effort. That is why the best-read blogs these days are written by professionals of one sort or another. Very few amateur blogs have taken hold. For every Vinography or 1WineDude that is succeeding, there are plenty who are not despite making big efforts.

And then there are the online journals like Palate Press and Zester Daily. Maybe one of them or one yet to be seen will evolve into a widely read journal that pays its own way comfortably through ad revenue and some level of subscription fee. So far, it has been very difficult for anyone but the established print journals to make the transition to electronic subscription revenues. With many of those publications run by sixties-somethings, there may be the makings of some form of opening for increased expert opinion online. It has yet to be seen, however. Will the coming of age of the Millenials make a difference? Everyone has an opinion about what those fairly active wine drinkers will do over time as they get older and wealthier, but they are yet to be a large force in the “pay for wine knowledge” area.

There are a few things about which I am quite clear. The battle for the minds of the winedrinkers is just now beginning to take shape. The blogosphere is going to change or it will become moribund. Expert opinion will always have a place, and some of it will be in traditional media like newspapers and magazines. Online distribution of information must and will, at some point, find a way to become monetized beyond the likes of the existing voices, but no one knows exactly what that form will be and whether it will be controlled by the existing voices or will be the product of someone whose work is so good, whose voice is so convincing, whose ability to put together a big enough mass of fungible information such that a new “publication” will arise. It is easy to imagine its shape. It is less easy to imagine that it will become the kind of force that arose in so many places in the ‘70s and ‘80s and continue today as mature businesses. Stay tuned but don’t hold your breath. The answer will not arrive any time soon.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
In the News: Huh? Can You Say that Again?

Tue, 17 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I confess that I like the offbeat news story, the one that makes you scratch you head and say “huh, what are these people thinking?”, and sitting this morning with coffee in hand, a few such smile-inducing headlines from the world of wine have popped up on my screen to brighten what is otherwise a typically gray Monday.

-- Just last week, Steve Heimhoff shared, on his eponymously named blog, a nasty comment from an unnamed winemaker who was dismayed by one of his reviews. We must admit that on infrequent occasion we, too, receive unhappy comments (see Charlie’s response to Heimoff over on the Heimoff blog), but nothing that goes quite so far as what follows.

It seems, according to a pending lawsuit, that sommelier Krunch Kretschmar of Bottled Grapes in Chicago responded to a negative Yelp review by one Cecelia Groark (yes, the names are both real) who had been bumped from a wine class offered by Mr. Kretschmar by establishing a blog in her name that blatantly but wholly fictitiously claimed that Ms. Groark was, in fact, guilty of embezzlement, drug addiction and prostitution. Then, it is alleged that he e-mailed Cecelia the link and informed her that “Now every time a company for a job or someone searches you on Google they will read my side of the story.” I am guessing that Cecelia might be moving up to much better wine in the near future.

-- Item, the second. It seems that the Liquor Control Commission of Manitoba in Canada has amended its rules to allow the sale of alcohol at movie theaters. Gord Mackintosh, minister responsible for the Liquor Control Act pointed to licensing regulation change as being entirely in keeping with the province’s new hospitality strategy. An entirely civilized move, I think, and one that is certain to be appreciated by anyone sitting through the next incarnation of “Hangover”.

-- California Grapes International, Inc. has announced plans to work with the American Embassy in Abu Dhabi to conduct multi-day wine events in order to “develop and secure new trading lines and business ventures in the UAE for California wines.” As I recollect, the Islamic world frowns on the consumption of alcohol, so I must assume that there are a great many very thirsty internationals and ex-pats in the UAE waiting for relief. Lots of luck to the folks at CGI, inc.

-- Finally, and my favorite news bite of them all, is the release of a new Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon called “Meteorito.” The first wine ever that can claim extra-terrestrial terroir, Meteorito was aged in barrel with a 4.5 billion-year-old meteorite borrowed from an American collector. Apparently the three-inch meteorite was tossed into a single barrel of Cabernet following primary fermentation, and then after 12 months or so, the wine was blended with a fairly sizeable amount of “untreated” Cabernet as to yield some 10,000 liters of wine. Said by its cosmically inclined English creator, astronomer Ian Hutcheon, to be a “livelier” wine by dint of its time sur météore, the wine is currently available only at the Centro Astronomico Tagua Tagua in Chile, but he is looking at export markets with a keen eye.

--Let me end with this happy thought: Go Niners!!

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Stop The Music—I Can Name That Clone In Three Numbers

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Here are four directions in wine that I would like to see stopped before they get out of hand.

⇒ NAME THAT CLONE
I absolutely agree that choice of clone in many varieties is essential, and, for those in the know, being able to have the clone or clones identified is of great interest. If you push me, I will admit that I happen to like Clone 6 Cabernet Sauvignon and Old Wente Clone Chardonnay. I would love to tell you which Pinot Noir clones I like but there are too many to remember and so many wines are blends of clones that knowing the names of the multiple choices named on the back label is simply beyond my need to know.

So, please, winemakers, keep experimenting with clones, but also please, stop telling me that your single-vineyard, terroir-driven this or that is the product of six clones and expect me to care.

⇒ PUT YOUR FLOWERS ON TRELLISES—NOT YOUR VINES
Is this too curmudgeonly of me? I like the look of old head-trained vines. And I like the empirical evidence that suggests such vines produce reasonable but not excessive crops and ripen their grapes to physiological maturity at lower sugars. Lower sugars mean better balance and less dried fruit. Paul Draper explains that Ridge will only use this pruning system for its grapes because he likes the results. The fact that he also insists on old vines adds to the chances that his winery will continue to lead the Zinfandel quality tables.

⇒ WILL A BUNCH OF WINERIES EXPERIMENT WITH CORKS VERSUS SCREWCAPS
We taste wines blind, but these days, when we smell a wine with excess sulfur dioxide, the gassy preservative added at bottling to almost every wine, we then find that most of them have been bottled with screwcap closures. The idea of screwcaps for wine storage does not offend intellectually. Any closure that protects the wine, mostly does not mess it up and allows it age as gracefully as the base cuvee permits is 100% acceptable. Cork is not perfect, and for a period of time, it was so imperfect that folks invented plastic imitations, glass and silicone alternatives and resorted to the very screwcaps that were once reserved for inexpensive wines. Our findings are totally anecdotal. We don’t keep track of preferences, but we do notice that screwcapped wines, and we are not tasting cheap wines, tend to be more possessed of chemical off-notes than cork-finished wines. It is time for a handful of wineries to run longitudinal experiments to determine once and for all which is worse—cork taint at the rate of 1% or excess sulfur dioxide at a much higher rate.

⇒ WHAT HAPPENED TO THE REQUIRED ALCOHOL STATEMENTS ON LABELS

I can guess the clones in a Pinot Noir a lot faster than I can find the alcohol statements on labels these days. Wineries will tell you that they are just following the law in the various forms, styles and placements of the alcohol statement. And I agree. For the most part, they are.

Your government allows the required alcohol statement to be printed in tiny print and to be placed sideways on labels or on the back label or almost any place the winery wants. Most wineries are fairly straightforward with their meeting of the law and in their attempts to be up front with their customers.

But, there is a reason why one of our tasters shows up with a magnifying glass. It is not to read any other part of the label but the alcohol statement. And, folks, it is getting worse out there because the anti-alcohol forces have scared some wineries into levels of subterfuge. I can name the clones of Pinot Noir when they are printed on the label because the wineries do so when they want me, and you, to know. It is time for alcohol labeling to come front and center and be as easy to read as the clonal nomenclature. Otherwise, it might as well be tossed out altogether. Come to think of it, maybe that would stop the “if it not under 14%, I won’t drink it” crowd dead in its tracks. They would have to taste wines, not read labels to know what they like.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Good Food, Good Wine and “Pointless” Nights at the Table

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I must admit that I alternately chuckle and grow weary of the endless debate and controversy that surrounds any discussion of the 100-point wine scoring system…or any other for that matter. Sometimes, the positions for and against recall scholasticism’s arguments of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, while at others, the battle seems nothing more than the nasty clash of angry ideologues redrawing the lines of permanent war.

I don’t like the 100-point system, but I too believe that it is 1) here to stay, 2) not inherently evil and 3) of reasonable value as long as kept in the context of an individual critic and not viewed as an absolute objective that should be obvious at all. We all seem to dislike it, but we all apologetically use it…it is the language and currency of the day and will remain so until something better comes along. For years now, it has been under attack, but it is still here. It is an imperfect road map, to be sure, but, even if it might not prevent one from hitting the occasional pothole or bump on the road, even an imperfect map can keep you from driving the car off the cliff.

Funny thing, though, “points” simply never occur to me when I am at the table enjoying this or that wine with this or that food. We spend four of five days a week rigorously tasting and, yes, grading wine, but when reaching the table all that changes. It is simply impossible to quantify the experience. There are way too many variables. There are “wow” moments, there are “ehs”, there are matches that are dismal, but I can honesty I cannot recall thinking in numerical terms as a way to express my happiness or disappointment with a food-and-wine match.

The point system, after all, is a quick relative index as to how much or how little I like a given wine relative to others of its type. I do not think of fine food and wine combinations in quite the same way. There are simply far too many variables for simple numbers to be of use. What the food is, how competently and creatively it was prepared, the quality of the wine, how well the two meshed, the service and ambiance of the restaurant, my particular mood and that of my companion…all these and more can impact the moment.

Great wines, truly great wines, can be made to taste awful if teamed with the wrong foods…think oysters and Hermitage or a shaved brussel-sprout salad dressed in a citrus vinagrette and old Cabernet (yes, I still remember that one!). On the other hand, wines of more humble means can be thoroughly delightful if the people, place and plate are right, and while, I would never hand out a hundred-point score to a simple Beaujolais, I recall a rainy night with a just such a wine and a bowl of lentils, bacon and fois gras that was about as good as good gets. The thing is, however, that there are better and lesser Beaujolais to be had. I could only hope that my restaurateur has chosen a good one, and in this case he did. If, however, I was shopping for a bottle to serve at home, I would not wholly ignore critical “points” in making my choice from a wider list of yet-untasted options. Yes, I confess that I pay attention to points too.

And that, dear readers, is all that I have to say about “point systems”...until the next time that it comes up for debate.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
I Despise The Hundred-Point System

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I despise the 100-point system. But I use it willingly because I know that words alone are an inadequate, imprecise way to impute qualitative value to wine or to any other product.

I have been writing tasting notes for more than three decades, and I challenge anyone to find a widely published comprehensive reviewer anywhere who writes more words about each individual wine than I, or my associate here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, Steve Eliot, does.

Yet, for all of those words and all of the value-loaded jargon that we intentionally employ, it is virtually impossible when reading dozen of notes within a few points of each other in our judgments to discern our small but important preferences without some additional notational form of communication.

Points do not take the place of words. They are an additive. They are a sharpener. They clarify. They do not describe. For description, one must read the words. Intensity cannot be described in numbers or stars or puffs or diamonds. Nor can delicacy, varietal precision, tannin levels, acid balance, ageworthiness or the host of other facets of a wine. For that we need words.

That is why Connoisseurs’ Guide writes much longer tasting notes than you will find anywhere else. That is why we provide food guidance with every note, often to the point of individual dishes. That is why we review only a handful of wines every day—so we can take the time with every wine before us to delve deeply into its soul, its viscera. One cannot write clear, complex descriptions without taking the time to understand the wine and then taking the time to write those long tasting notes.

Still, there are some in this world who question the value of rating systems, whether 100-points or anything else. Some of the criticism seems misguided. Yet, in many ways, it is a reaction to the grade inflation that has produced reviews like the one recently seen in the Wine Advocate in which 80% of the reviews scored 90 points or better. Scores like that diminish the value of those scores, and to a large extent of the wines themselves. The idea of wine evaluations done for readers is to differentiate the average from the good and the good from the excellent. When everything is very, very good to excellent, there is no differentiation. And very little critical judgment exercised.

It is the bastardization of the system, then, that I despise. I hate it that the range of points used has become so narrow. I hate it that folks dispense 90 points like Halloween candy—every kid on the block gets some. I hate that the misuse of the rating systems reflects badly on all of us—even when our publication has tried to stay true to itself. Still, the world is changing and reviewers like ourselves are stuck with an imperfect system (all rating systems are imperfect, by the way) that works both for us and against us.

Into that arena of “what value do points have today” has stepped Mike Steinberger, one of the most learned, erudite commentators on the wine scene. I commend his most recent blogs to you because they and the comments that follow, while not providing a definitive answer to a question that has none, nevertheless manage to look at the problem from many angles and ultimately provide plenty of food for thought.

http://winediarist.com/the-point-less-life/

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Friday Fishwrap
Bourbon In Sonoma? The Grain and The Grape Have Hooked Up?

Fri, 06 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

That good old advice—“never mix the grape and the grain”—may have finally been overthrown.

The Bourbon in question may have been born in Kentucky, but it was brought to finishing school in Sonoma and is better off for the experience. The “it”, in this case, is a remarkable new Bourbon with the title Hooker’s House Sonoma-Style American Bourbon, named for civil-war General Joseph Hooker who is apocryphally claimed to be responsible for all sorts of licentious behavior.

I stumbled across Hooker’s House last night while tracking down a few favorite Zinfandels, and, curiosity being the soul of my profession, a bottle made its way home with me. A new label, by its nature, will always catch my eye, but it was the bottle’s claim to be Sonoma-Style Bourbon that sealed the sale.

It turns out that the folks responsible for Limoncello di Sonoma decided to try their hands at finishing a selection of four-year-old single-barrel Kentucky Bourbon in used Pinot Noir barrels. Now, I have been wondering, given the proliferation of various wine-barrel-finished Single-Malt Scotches, just when would someone might try the same with spirits made closer to home, and, as this offering attests, the marriage of corn-and-rye spirits and wine-barrel spice can be a happy one.

With a mash bill of 54% corn and 46% rye, Hooker’s House is at once very rich and slightly spicier than its its Kentucky cousins that are typically more reliant on corn—very often closer to 70% with far less rye. Moreover, the effects of spending nearly a year in Pinot Noir barrels are hard to miss. There is a distinct undercurrent of cherries to the more classic Bourbon traits of maple and vanilla, and the whiskey smacks of Pinot by way of its almost velvety feel. It is bottled at 100 proof after having been cut with Sonoma spring water, and it is, quite simply, a unique spirit with a voice all its own.

It is so smooth and supple as to make drinking neat easy, but its depth and ongoing richness make for some intriguing possibilities in mixed drinks, and I could not agree more with David Driscoll, the spirits buyer for San Francisco’s K & L Wine Merchants, who touts it as one to try in a classic Manhattan. If there is a downside, it is that there is not a lot of it to be had, and its finding might take a bit of a search. On a cheerier note, its modest price of $36.00 will please the pocketbooks of those lucky enough to track down a bottle or two, and if, like me, you are interested in the very exciting new wave of innovative American spirits, it is one not to miss.

http://www.prohibition-spirits.com/

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Thursday Thorns
A Brief Polemic About Natural Wine

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There is a lot to be said about “natural wine”. Some of it makes sense, and some of it is nothing more than biased rhetoric. The latter is the work of folks who tred a different path wanting to make us think that they are the keepers of truth, justice and the American way.

In the last couple of days, two of the more thoughtful voices in the wine blogosphere, Tom Wark over on his blog, FERMENTATION, http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/2012/01/natural-wine-ugly-underbelly.html, and Hardy Wallace on his entitled DIRTY SOUTH WINE, http://www.dirtysouthwine.com/my_weblog/2012/01/naturalwinepurrty.html, have discussed the rising phenomenon of “my way is better than your way” rhetoric that has become so very common in wine discussions.

Mr. Wark decries the phenomenon. Mr. Wallace, whose column is derivative of the Wark comments, sides with the naturalists.

The Wallace rationale that he does not drink fruit juice made from concentrate so why drink wine that has been made with more than minimal intervention from man is pretty solid—but only for Mr. Wallace and for those who prefer process to taste in choosing their wines.

It is hard for me, as a person who has been tasting wine professionally for three decades plus, to accept that process is the message. Process is process. As long as process does no harm to me, to consumers, to the environment, then it is acceptable. All wine is “made”. We have a name for those who control the process. It is “winemaker”. And, while some winemakers are less interventionalist than others, they all intervene. Otherwise, all grapes would be raisins and all wine would be vinegar.

So, when I hear the sloganeers for biodynamic or organic or sustainably grown wines denigrating those who do not subscribe to their specific subsets of process, I simply roll my eyes in wonderment and ask them if their wines taste better or not.

Of course, I have an answer for them after all these years—some do and some do not, but there is no body of proof that the processes of minimalism produce superior wines to those that are made from the same grapes with more but careful and thoughtful intervention.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
In Which I Resolve, I Vow, To Never Eat Again

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I am seriously thinking about giving up eating. As I sit here with my morning “cup of Joe”, I am far more inclined to search out “food for thought” then another meal. I am contemplating the new year ahead and feeling the journalistic wheels groan and grudgingly start to turn.

I suppose, however, as far as the blogosphere and intellectual sustenance goes, I wish the menu was longer and more interesting. 2012 is starting out right where 2011 left off with a flurry of opinions about the 100-point scale, alcohol levels, “authenticity”, “manipulation” and the fuzzy grail of terroir…and what is or is not going on at the Wine Advocate. I wonder what new controversies will take their place, what new bricks will be hurled. I am sure that in the course of the year, I will pick a few up and throw them back in the direction whence they came, but I confess to being bored by argument and pledge to look for truth in the glass not in debate.

My own January resolution is to embrace the education of experience rather than rhetoric. That is where the excitement exists.

No litmus tests, no a priori assumptions. No assumptions of winemaker intent and talent based on alcohol numbers or if the wine was produced by an acolyte of one of a host of natural, sustainable, organic, biodynamic “religions”. Don’t get me wrong, I am interested and intellectually curious in the hows and whys of grape growing and winemaking , but, at the end of the day, I happen to believe that good is good and crap is crap regardless of how it is created.

I want to be surprised and renewed. I want to be entertained and seduced. I want to be inspired. That, after all, is what great wine is all about. Oh, I expect disappointment and maybe even a bit of heartache along the year’s way, but it’s like what they say about being better to have loved and lost. It is how it has been for me from the very beginning, and I do not intend on changing.

I do not in any way feel that great wine is an endangered species poised on the edge of extinction owing to the manipulations of godless scientists who have long sense forgotten the truth to be found in Eden…or in Steiner’s Atlantis. I am no enological Luddite. Neither, however, am I interested in the ocean of industrial plonk that crowds grocery-store shelves. But, at the same time, I do not believe that the latter poses any threat to the wines that I love.

There are more well-made wines available today than ever before, and I intend on tasting all that I can. New producers, new vineyards, new vintages…that is what lies ahead this year, and I have no time to waste in worry and the wringing of hands lest I miss any of them.

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Tuesday Tributes
Guns or Wine: That Is The Question

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I am here to offer an alternative to the American people. No, not an alternative to Mitt or Barak, but to guns. I propose, if elected to replace all guns in the United States with bottles of wine—American wine.

It was just announced that the largest increase in any gift category in the United States was in firearms. Up 100% from last year, and mostly sold to people who already own guns. Guns are not like wine, however. One can only shoot one gun at a time unless you happen to be Wild Bill Hickok or Hopalong Cassidy.

Wine is different. One always needs more than one wine unless one is drinking alone—and we don’t advocate that here in wine country. Always drink with friends, and drink more than one bottle unless you are driving. Admittedly, both guns and wine are collectables, but we use up our wine collections a lot faster than we use up our guns. Violent crime, which includes gun crimes, was down 6% in 2011—so why the increase in gun sales?

Wine sales also increased, but by a much smaller margin. Imagine if all those gun sales had been converted into sales of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir — or of Zinfandel and Syrah and Merlot. I am predicting here and now that sales of wine instead of guns would bring about an even faster drop in the rise of violent crime.

Wine, after all, is the beverage of moderation. I am reminded that “moderate” is a dirty word in Iowa today. No one wants to be called a “moderate”, but, perhaps, just perhaps, if we could get those politicians and Iowans to drink more wine, there might be more moderation in this world.

That’s my position and I am sticking with it until the last caucus goer has got up and went. Then it is on to New Hampshire where we will resume the fight for wine not guns.

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Thursday Thorns
My Top Ten Wines of 2011

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

As Charlie explained in yesterday’s posting, we taste thousands of wines for review every year, and, I must confess that there are days when the job can be, well…a job. There are other times, however, when what we do is genuinely exciting, when a wine comes along that makes me sit up and take notice. It may be one that stuns with its strength or it may be one that slowly draws me in with its almost sneaky complexity, and these are wines that linger long in the mind after tasting is done and the glasses are put back on the shelf. They are wines that I would like to revisit again and again.

Here, then, are my most memorable wines tasted in 2011, my benchmarks for what was a fascinating year at the tasting table. They are the kinds of wines that simply make it impossible to get tired of doing what we do.

ALYSIAN Pinot Noir Rochioli River Block 2008
As graceful and wonderfully well-balanced as it is incisively fruity, Gary Farrell’s Rochioli River Block stands out as one of the very best of a surprisingly good bunch of 2008 Pinots from Russian River Valley’s west side.

DuMOL Pinot Noir Ryan 2008
DuMOL’s Pinots are generally among the richer efforts to be found, and, when at their finest as they are here, they are stunning wines of extraordinary concentration and depth.

FREESTONE Chardonnay Sonoma Coast 2008
There is no question that Freestone has become an important winery to watch, and this beautifully balanced bottling exhibits the vibrancy and clarity of Sonoma Coast Chardonnay at its finest.

GRGICH HILLS Sauvignon Blanc Essence 2009
Year in and year out, this bottling remains the benchmark for California Sauvignon Blanc. None is better than Grgich Hills in consistently capturing the varietal’s freshness, focus and fruity energy, and the 2009 shows the winery in top form.

JOSEPH PHELPS Insignia 2008
Here is the latest in from a perennial favorite, and the wine’s hallmark combination of layered richness, polish and sheer beauty once again tag it as one of Napa Valley’s most stylish red wines.

TALLEY Pinot Noir Rosemary’s Vineyard 2008
Our tastings this past year were marked by an embarrassment of riches when it came to outstanding new Pinots, and this deep, impeccably balanced offering reminds that the North Coast does not have a monopoly in producing world-class examples.

MOONE-TSAI Cabernet Sauvignon Cor Leonis 2008
A top-ten selection on both Charlie’s and my scorecards, Moone-Tsai’s striking new Cabernet speaks directly to what Napa Valley does best, and it takes a place at the very head of the class.

RAVENSWOOD Zinfandel Teldeschi Vineyard 2008
Few winemakers have quite the touch with Zinfandel as winemaker Joel Peterson, and, while Joel earns a tip of the CGCW hat for his many single-vineyard bottlings, the 2008 Teldeschi is the most classic and compelling expression of the grape to be had.

SCHRAMSBERG J. SCHRAM Brut Rosé 2004
The J. Schram Brut Rosé has turned up on the “best of the year” lists of a many wine writers, and there is a good reason why. It is a wine of incomparable richness and crafting, and it will make more than a few of its French cousins blush with envy.

SHAFER Syrah Relentless 2007
Always a wine of sheer strength and power, Shafer’s Relentless hits new heights in 2007. It is as deep and flavorful as ever, but its remarkable structure and uncanny balance make it, for me, the very best bottling to date.

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Wine and Food Wednesday
My Top Ten Wines of 2011

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Top ten lists are pretty easy to come by these days. They are like noses. Everybody has one. This one is special—because it’s mine.

We taste thousands of wines each year for Connoisseurs’ Guide reviews, and thousands more at tastings we attend as way of getting ahead on new releases and keeping up with wines from all around the world. But, in compiling this list of my top wines for the past year, I am limiting myself to wines that I tasted blind for review. Tasting wines for review is what we do professionally, and this list contains only wines tasted in the neutral circumstances of blind, peer-to-peer comparisons at the Connoisseurs’ Guide table.

Each of the wines presented below earned three stars in Connoisseurs’ Guide. That is our equivalent of 95-98 points in our version of the 100-point system. Since we do not give 99 or 100 points and rarely give 98s, one could argue that these are our 97-100 point wines if one were to compare them to the scores that appear virtually everywhere else. It will turn out, of course, that many or even most of these wines are to near impossible to find today. In that, we share in the disadvantage that every year-end list possesses. Still, if you want the best, it is always harder to find than the average.

Each of the wines below is presented with brief commentary. These pithy bits of information are not meant to be full tasting notes. For that, I refer you to the pages of Connoisseurs’ Guide where these wines have been reviewed in depth and detail during the course of the past year.

MY TOP TEN (in alphabetical order)

CHATEAU STE. MICHELLE LH Riesling Ethos 2007
Held long enough at the winery to develop real varietal expression along with the rich opulence and classic balance of exceptional dessert Riesling.

GRGICH HILLS Sauvignon Blanc Essence 2009
For a couple of decades now, Grgich Hills has made Sauvignon Blanc that is incredibly well-balanced, wonderfully deep and focused and capable of aging for ten years and more. This is such a wine, and it proves that Sauvignon Blanc in California can produce wines of real majesty.

JC CELLARS Syrah Buffalo Hill 2008
Jeff Cohn told us that this about-to-be planted vineyard located at the western edge of the Rockpile AVA would become his best because the exposure and the soils were going to make it so. And right he was. Power, solid fruit and layered complexity allow this full-bodied wine to shine.

KOSTA-BROWNE Pinot Noir Gap’s Crown Vineyard 2009
Pinot Noir in the hands of Kosta Browne tops our charts year in and year out. This one is my choice among the winery’s several brilliant bottlings.

MOONE-TSAI Cabernet Sauvignon Cor Leonis 2008
Heart of the lion, indeed. With so many superb Napa Cabernets from which to choose, I have found this compelling effort to be my most exciting Cab discovery of 2011.

PRIDE Reserve Claret 2007
Merlot-dominated and solid in every dimension, this complex effort wraps succulent, keenly focused fruit in a Cabernet-like blanket. Look for it to age two decades.

RAVENSWOOD Zinfandel Teldeschi Vineyard 2008
The deep and energetic berryish fruit married to a touches of spice and sympathetic oak is perfectly supported by firm but not intrusive acidity and adds up to a Zinfandel with great flavor and great manners.

SCHRAMSBERG J. SCHRAM Brut Rose 2004
I admit it. I like bubbles. And, it does not get much better than this in sparkling wine no matter on which side of the Atlantic it is grown.

STAGLIN Cabernet Sauvignon 2008
Purists will argue that this wine cannot be treated like royalty because it is too ripe. I say, “Nonsense”. Taste the wine, not the label statement, and discover one of the most pure statements of West Rutherford Cabernet Sauvignon available anywhere.

WILLIAMS SELYEM Pinot Noir Westside Road Neighbors 2009
Williams Selyem, like Kosta Browne, makes a basketful of superb Pinots—most of which are vineyard designates. But this wine, from several properties along Westside Road, arguably the first home of superb Russian River Pinot, seems always to be spot on when it comes to my markers for Pinot.

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Friday Fishwrap
Holiday Thoughts and Wishes

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot and Charles Olken

Those of us who long ago tossed rationality aside in our embrace of things vinous can be a funny lot. Some may wonder how can anyone possibly devote so much time and energy studying, tasting, spending money on and talking, talking, talking about wine.

We wonder too. It is only wine after all. We know that a good many friends and our significant-others have rolled their eyes and looked askance at our affliction over the years, but here and there amidst the utter boredom and glazed looks of numbness we may have caused, we like to think that, at times, we have delivered discovery and delight and sheer pleasure as well. For the former, we apologize, and for the latter we need no thanks…those moments are reward enough in themselves.

We subscribe to the notion that wine’s first duty is to facilitate friendship, and that good wine does not want drinking alone. Clifton Fadiman once wrote that “a bottle of wine begs to be shared; I have never met a miserly wine lover.” Amen.

An old French proverb on the other hand says that “the best use of bad wine is to drive away poor relations”. We suppose that the two tidbits of wisdom have their own not-mutually-exclusive truths, but we know which one will guide us as the holidays loom large.

We have still last-minute shopping to do, far more than we would like to admit. And poor Steve has not yet settled on a menu for Christmas dinner whereas Steve and Charlie both, of course, have already picked out the wines. It is no time for poor relations, and no time for bad wine. Our best Holiday wishes for all of our readers are that their celebrations see no need for use of the bad stuff and that their season is one of genuine sharing.

Thank you all for your comments and your continuing support over the years. May the week, the month, the year ahead be filled with joy and peace and prosperity and good wine.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Criticizing Blake Gray

Thu, 22 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

My friend Gray Blake is in trouble again. I think he looks for it, enjoys it. And even when I get his name backwards, he is still in trouble. This time, he is picking on Antonio Galloni, who some of you will remember is Robert Parker’s handpicked replacement to cover California wine.

Mr. Blake has apparently been nosing around the way that Galloni has set up to do business here in California. Galloni writes in an email, justifying but not fully explaining why he works through local vintners’ organizations to find the wines he will review, that he does not charge the organizations to taste and that he insists that those organizations treat all local wineries equally whether or not they choose to belong to said organizations.

Turns out however, that the truth lies somewhere else. The organizations are essentially strong-arming wineries that do not belong to their group into joining under threat that their wines will not be passed along to Galloni (Parker) for review. Blake Gray, being the journalist that he is, has dug around for the back channel story and found the offending local emails and published them in his blog. He of course could not miss the obvious contradiction between the Galloni statement of policy and the local organization statement of policy.

I call Blake G. my friend, but the truth is that we are journalistic acquaintances who have crossed swords more than once. Blake can be a little bit prickly that way, and I can be a little “in your face” with my opinions at times. Still, we are more friends than not. But, after all, truth is truth, and if my truth offends Blake, well, too damn bad.

And that, folks, is how I react to all the hullabaloo that broke out over on his blog after he published the truth. Truth is truth, and too damn bad if some folks think it is muckraking or sensationalism. If he were wrong or shading the facts, then he would rightfully be in trouble. But, he is not. He has published actual statements from the folks involved and hung them on their petards. For that, he is being criticized. Blake is no different from the rest of us, save for liking to dig out the details better than most of us, and for doing that, he should be congratulated, not criticized.

Congratulations, Gray. We are friends again—for today.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Fresh Dungeness Crab Is In—And So Is Sauvignon Blanc

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

One of the great pleasures of a lifetime spent in the study and appreciation of wine is that of endless discovery, of knowing that there are always new wines, new winemakers and new vintages waiting around each corner. The search is as fascinating and as much fun as the finding. It is impossible to be bored, and, if you think you have seen it all, I would respectfully suggest that you think again.

Sometimes, however, it is nice to stop for a minute and revisit an old friend, one that reminds that there is difference between being new and interesting and, with apologies to all of the eye-of-the-beholder subjectivists out there, being great.

That point was driven home last week when attending a remarkable five-course pop-up dinner hosted by the Bernal Supper Club and Chef John C. Fink at San Francisco’s Winemaker’s Speakeasy restaurant. Chef Fink is the mind behind The Whole Beast, a catering company which embraces the very sensible idea that a great dish starts with the best ingredients, and, in John’s case, that begins with the way in which an animal is raised and ends with making full use of every part of the animal in the kitchen.

While Riesling would of course be a first-rate choice for a dinner that features crab five ways, and I suspect that a good one would have shown quite well on this particular evening, I opted for something different. A pleasant, palate-waking first glass of the crisp, mildly minerally 2009 Bosnian Zilavka from Brkic met the obligation to try something new, but it was the 2007 Merry Edwards Sauvignon Blanc that I pulled from the cellar that was the star of the evening.

Good Sauvignon Blanc, I mean really good ones, are still among my favorite white wines, and, I would argue, they are among the most versatile mealtime matches to be found. They rarely win rave reviews in the press and are seen in too many eyes as being inherently incapable of earning high “scores”. They are rarely spoken of in terms of complexity and aging potential, but as we have found on a good many occasions here at CGCW, the best bottlings can age brilliantly and will exhibit stunning depth. I still recall a twenty-year old Joseph Phelps Sauvignon Blanc opened for our millennial New Year’s dinner that was as memorable as any of the several legendary Burgundies, Pinots and Cabernets that had been saved for the event.

Admittedly, the bottling from Ms.Edwards still had plenty of room for further growth, but it was clearly hitting full stride in its fourth year and was a rich, layered, very vital and impeccably balanced wine that sailed through the meal in fine form. From a silky, wonderfully rich crab bisque to raviolis of crab coral, chanterelles, leeks and spinach to deep-fried cracked crab served in a ginger black-peppercorn sauce, the wine seemed to show different faces with each course, and was uncannily refreshing in one instance and quite rich and substantial in another.

Oh, the crab? It was nothing short of splendid—but the night belonged to Merry Edwards and her stunning Sauvignon Blanc.
http://thewholebeastsf.com/Home_Page.html

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Monday Manifestos
The Buck Stops Here—I Accept Full Responsibility For Ruining My Friends’ Palates

Mon, 19 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I confess. I drank a 14.8% alcohol Lewis Cabernet and liked it. And then I liked a 15.5% Tolosa Syrah.

I know I am not supposed to like wines over 14% alcohol. The “inner circle” boys and girls in the wine-pushing biz tell me so. Dan Berger accused me of being part of the conspiracy (my word, not his) that keeps Napa Valley Cabernet so popular. Apparently, we are all supposed to find wines that are deep, rich, full of varietal character bursting from the glass to be “parodies of themselves”, “too hot to drink more than one glass”, “boringly similar”, “indistinguishable as to variety and place”.

I confess. I liked those wines the other night. And I confess to having a bunch of friends who also liked them. The Lewis Cabernet was so popular that its corks just kept popping out of the bottle—or perhaps they were simply being chased away by all that alcohol.

And here is something else to which I confess. I brought most of the wine to this party of friends. Some people bring hors d’ouevres, some bring salads, some bring desserts. I bring wine that I like. It’s my fault that an Alysian Chardonnay, well over the 14% alcohol level and thus verboten at many restaurants in this fair city these days, was slurped down. I did warn folks in advance. Told them flat out that the wine broke the rules of the “new paradigm” for Chardonnay. A funny thing happened. A couple of folks tried it anyhow, and the next thing you know, they were having a second glass.

That is when I revealed myself. Took full blame for their evil ways. I explained that the reasons they could like wines with alcohols that violated the “new trendsetters’ dicta” were several fold. First of all, the wine tasted good to them. They actually drank those wines because they liked them. It was not because I brought the wine—although I take full responsibility. It was because they found them tasty, attractive, satisfying.

Okay, I said, “but aren’t they flat and boring by the second glass?” Nope. And once I again I confessed and explained. It was not just that the wines were full of flavor. It was because they were also in balance. The Lewis, the Tolosa, the Alysian all had perfect pitch. Over the course of a long evening of grazing on everything from bacon-wrapped shrimp hot off the barbie to a variety of sliders on Sunshine Bakery buns and everything in between, the folks at the party drank the wines that they liked and not the labels. Admittedly, they are not part of the “in crowd”. They are ordinary, middle class San Franciscans who drink a lot of wine because that is what they do. They/we like wine here, and we drink it with dinner.

And, we are not bound by New Rules. We are driven to drink what we like. And we still like wines with flavor and balance. If that is my fault, then I accept full responsibility. The buck stops here. I did it. I brought the wine.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Celebrating The Coombsville AVA

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Students of vinous geography will ask themselves, “Why didn’t it happen years ago?” Indeed, this whole AVA thing is riddled with inconsistency, and finally one of the absent pieces has been added.

So, congratulations to the folks who have finally put Coombsville on the map. As Coombsville grower Tom Farella said so aptly, “When people look at it on the map, they will wonder why it wasn’t there all the time”. And he will get no argument from me. The wine maps are missing all kinds of pieces and Coombsville is one of them.

But, even while we celebrate this useful addition to the AVA coverage of the Napa Valley, it is useful to take a step back and ask ourselves, and indeed, to ask the wineries and growers in Coombsville what just happened here.

To be sure, the spot on the map east of Napa City, with its rolling terrain and occasional plantings does fit comfortably on the wine maps. And, if the two dozen or so wineries located there are not household names, nevertheless, they are just a bike ride away east of Napa City and occupy terrain that is essentially separate from other areas that fall under the Napa Valley rubric.

No one criticized the proposed AVA during its hearing period, and perhaps that is because we have become used to the benefits of defining small areas as well as accepting of the failings of the existing system. And in this case, one has to be careful with Coombsville as well. It is certainly a cool growing area with sites that are often on a par with the Carneros district. Yet, the Coombsville AVA includes hillsides that rise up nearly 2,000 feet. With such wide variations in elevation and exposure, Coombsville can grow anything from Pinot Noir to Cabernet Sauvignon to Syrah. And while we can expect some consistency from the AVA because most of its vines are on a broad plain east of Napa, there are going to inconsistencies as well.

I am tempted to blame these inconsistencies on the framers of the AVA, but, frankly, the AVA system gets the credit for allowing places like Coombsville to finally show up on wine maps while also allowing inconsistencies in expectations and thus undermining at least part of the intent and potential value of the AVA system itself.

Still, today is a day for celebration. I have enjoyed my visits to the Coombsville area and appreciate that one will not find a hotel or fancy restaurant or tour bus in the area. Coombsville reminds of what wine country used to be. In that, we can be thankful. But not to worry. The fancy destinations are nearby for all, including me, who need our fixes of fancy. So, welcome Coombsville. As your name shows up more and more on wine labels, we will get to know you better and to take your measure more completely.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Have Some Madeira, My Dear

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

How did the world lose sight of these unique wines? This year, I am going to spread some Madeira around.

It has happened again. Christmas has a nasty habit of sneaking up on me, and what with the oh-so-significant daily buzz about Jay Miller and the Wine Advocate occupying my every thought (yes, that is sarcasm you hear), I have again been blindsided by the seemingly sudden arrival of the holidays and need to kick into high gear or be left behind. There are presents to buy and menus to plan, and I think that this year Madiera will figure prominently in meeting my seasonal duties.

Despite the fact that Madeira has for the last decade or so been winning new recognition and fans owing largely to the tireless efforts of Madeira guru Mannie Berk, it is still among the most underappreciated of the world’s truly great wines. Frankly, that suits me just fine. There will be no overcrowding in the Maderia aisle of my favorite wine stores, no concerns about being maced as I fight for the last bottle of prized Verdelho, no worries about the wines being sold out.

Even though I know that I am not alone in appreciating Madeira, I sometimes feel like it is my own little secret, and, since surprising my wine-conscious family and friends is my lot, I know they will be pleased at the wines’ utter uniqueness and downright delicious differences from the normal fare. There are lighter Sercials for aperitif drinking and soups. There are richer Verdelhos to drink through the meal, but, for me, it is the great, sweet, meal-ending Buals and Malmseys that I look forward to most at this time of year. It is as if they were conceived with the classic desserts of Christmas in mind. The latter, especially, can make the dreaded fruitcake a delight, and from pecan pie to panforte, plum pudding to preserved fruits, no wine I know surpasses the sweeter pair of Madeiras in seamlessly fitting in at the holiday dessert table.

If you are new to Madeira and want to see what the wines offer, know that there are plenty of first-rate bottlings to be had from easy-to-find producers like Henriques & Henriques, Blandys, Leacock, and Miles to name but a few. It has been quite a long time, in fact, since I have tasted a bad Madeira, but I do admit to a favorite. I have a particular fondness for the wines of Barbeito, especially those of the winery’s “Historic Series.” I recently stumbled across a link on Barbeito’s website under the heading of “Barbeito and Food” (http://www.vinhosbarbeito.com/en/barbeito-a-food/introduction.html) that is an extraordinarily useful primer for matching Madeiras with food, and I would encourage wine lovers of every stripe to check in for a visit.

There are times when I really do not need to know why a wine works with food, times when I would put my critic’s hat aside and simply get lost in the magic of a great food and wine marriage. That is just what I plan to do this Christmas, and Madeira will be in my glass.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
How To Judge A Wine Critic—Use The Caesar’s Wife Rule

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is simple enough. The world needs to apply the Caesar’s Wife Rule in judging the ethics and independence of wine critics. Let them do nothing that makes them suspect in any way.

Steve Heimoff in his contributions to this topic allowed that some of the things that Parker and his minions have done do not set off alarm bells for him. That is true to some extent, because so much of what Parker or any other useful critic does in genuine and above suspicion—but not all. Some of what Parker states as policy are exceptions to the rule. Heimoff has done an admirable job of breaking down the Parker policies and analyzing them. You can find his comments at:

http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2011/12/12/blind-tasting-and-parker-the-issue-that-wont-go-away/comment-page-1/#comment-244015.

But then, Heimoff writes, “Loopholes are funny things. Everybody uses them.” In response, I offer the following:

With all due respect, Loopholes are nothing more--loopholes.

I see no reason why there need to be loopholes for most of what Parker mentions. Go back and look at those loopholes. They constitute the bulk of his highest ratings and all of his so-called bargain priced wines.

I see no reason why wine critics should taste wine for evaluative review in a variety of settings. Taste the wine in your tasting setting and in the same numbers. Routine may be boring but it is also the path to consistency.

I see no reason why wine critics should ever taste wine for review with the labels showing and at the wineries. It is not enough to be transparent about this practice, about which most writers are not including Parker. This practice is tantamount to payola for new wines. Knowing that one is tasting Screaming Eagle at Screaming Eagle or DRC at DRC is the pathway to exaggerated ratings. When I asked a winery owner if he thought that this practice was intellectually honest, he replied, “I get better scores that way”.

There is a simple standard. It applies to Parker and his minions. It applies to me and it applies to you. It is the caesar’s wife rule. Do we follow practices that leave our ratings above suspicion? If we do not, then our ratings are suspect.

Sadly for all writers, when someone like Parker or the folks in New Zealand who charge for reviews do things that raise big suspicions, all of us who try to write unbiased, independent reviews come under suspicion.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
The Truth About The Wine News

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Last week was a pretty gloomy wine time for wine, but it turns out that there are rays of sunshine beneath the dark clouds and I have found them.

People and wineries may fade from our presence, grapes have gone unpicked and Syrah remains hard to sell, but there is always progress, always a new big thing, always improvement on the horizon. We tend to focus on our losses, scandals, disasters. Let us today, look on the other side.

HEADLINE: Cows Fed With Wine Dregs Emit Less Methane
You may think that this item is one of those pseudo-scientific maunderings that will have no useful purpose in real life. Cows produce so much methane that they are one of the single largest identifiable contributors to green house gasses—right after folks like you and me. Now, I am not pooh-poohing any reduction in the level of flatulence in this world, but I have a better idea. It seems to me that we need to feed wine dregs to young boys, dogs and great grandparents. Now there is some flatulence whose reduction will really benefit mankind.

HEADLINE: Shanghai, Lodi Meet
I sometimes think I am alone in championing the cause of Lodi wines. Not all, mind you, but then again, I don’t champion all West Rutherford Bench Cabernets or Santa Maria Valley Pinots or Dry Creek Zinfandels. Lodi wine is not a dirty word to me. Their all kinds of interesting wines coming out of Lodi and its overlapping sub-appellations whose varied soils, exposures and elevations do give Lodi more variation in style than is sometimes recognized. Still, I was a bit dismayed by this headline. I mean, has Lodi abandoned us? Have the Chinese bought yet another American enterprise—this time a whole town? I know some places they are welcome to take off our hands, but not Lodi. Please, not Lodi.

HEADLINE: Orange Wine Is Sommelier’s Newest Tipple
I know home winemakers who have been making orange wine for years. The recipe is not all that difficult. Orange juice, a bag of sugar to boost the potential alcohol and bring it into balance and some yeast. But, these tricky sommeliers are going the amateurs one better. They are actually encouraging some would-be professional winemakers to oxidize the hell out of their wines in order to achieve this whole new category of tipple. I have only had a few of these creations, and in my line of work, I have learned not to pooh-pooh (how did we get back to methane?) anything—just judge what is in the glass of each wine that comes down the pike. But there are times when caution needs to be thrown to the wind. So, here goes. Please, winemakers, feed some wine dregs to your orange wine so it smells better.

HEADLINE: Manipulative Winemaking Declared A Fault
Okay, I get it. My salad is being destroyed by oil and vinegar. My steak is being destroyed by heat, salt, pepper and a rub of garlic. My leg of lamb is being ruined by rosemary. My Chardonnay actually has yeast added to it rather than being fermented with whatever is out there in the ether.

Why don’t these folks get it? Short of engaging in processes that will harm human life or cattle or the planet, the best practices in winemaking are those that are good for the wine. A chef does not forego technique and seasoning and neither should winemakers. Wine is just the half life of vinegar. Don’t these folks understand that they are manipulating fermented grape juice just to stop it from following its natural course?

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
A Sad Week For Winewriting as Three Depart

Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

In a week that saw the sacking of Jay Miller and passing of the legendary Robert Lawrence Balzer, it is the decision by Jeff Lefevere to stop blogging that came as the biggest surprise and has left me personally quite disappointed.

Out in the wine blogosphere, it has been a week devoted to changes even if the incessant din surrounding the pending departure of The Wine Advocate’s Jay Miller has made the others a bit hard to notice. It was with sorrow that I heard of Robert Lawrence Balzer’s passing after a long and well-lived life, though my mood was lightened by appreciative comments from a few who knew him and his work. I was a bit saddened, in a different way of course, by Jeff Lefevere’s announcement that he was suspending his Good Grape: A Wine Manifesto blog. While, like other well-wishers, I respect and very much understand his decision, I am nonetheless sorry to see him go.

Good writing is work, very hard work if truth is to be told, and I would count Jeff among those who worked at the craft. I read a good many blogs, but most on an intermittent basis at best. Jeff’s was one of the few sites to which I would make routine visits. His combination of intellect, insight, passion and rock-solid journalism made for very good reading. The serious work that went into his articles was obvious, and it was all the more remarkable by dint of that fact that wine-writing is not his “real” job.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of wine blogs have flickered and then faded away upon the recognition that the reward for such work was limited to a few complimentary comments, a handful of sample bottles if lucky and an occasional junket for those considered by the business of wine to be among the influential minority. None of these, of course, pays the bills. Blogging in general has been likened by some to the self-indulgent yapping of poodles, and, if a little severe, it is an observation with which I at times concur…but, not always.

Casual blogging will not disappear, but neither will it supplant the ever-growing Internet presence of credible, professional journalism. While the Internet allows every voice to be heard, not every one is worth listening to, and yet, as Tom Wark has argued in his blog Fermentation, there is a desire and need for some sort of “authority” on the part of all would-be learners. The Internet is the medium for a new generation of commentators and observers, and it is one whose very nature may well change how we perceive ourselves and what we view as important. If the medium is not the message, it certainly changes the way in which the latter is seen. “Authority”, however, will as always be decided by those who seek it. What is true and reliable and useful will always be found out. It may take some time, but the winnowing has already begun. It is too bad that in this case some of the best wheat is lost with the chaff.

Jeff, I will miss your articles, and I secretly hope that the title of your last posting is true…that you are going on hiatus. I would much prefer “au revoir” to “adieu”. I expect that we will hear from you again.

You can see Jeff’s insightful comments at http://goodgrape.com/index.php

A Further Comment From Charles Olken, CGCW Publisher
It is no secret that most of the leading winewriters are in their sixties—Laube, Parker, Heimoff, Olken, Steiman. They will all need to be replaced by a younger generation of writers who have earned their chops in various parts of the wine biz. To me, Jeff Lefevere was one of those whose intellect and insights measured up to his passion. All of us who write about wine have the passion. Few of us have true insight. Jeff Lefevere is one of those who does. And I join my colleague, Steve Eliot, in hoping that Jeff’s role in winewriting will ultimately expand, not contract.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Why I Could Drink Pinot Noir Forever

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Some wine and food combinations are born in heaven, and I know the secret that could make me drink Pinot Noir forever.

It is the veal chop with cognac mustard cream sauce that Mrs. Olken prepared as an accompaniment to tonight’s Pinot Noir tasting. It is one of those combinations of great ingredients that become better for being partnered on a plate, and just the thought of one of those bone-in, pan-grilled beauties topped with the luscious sauce makes me salivate. Never mind that some scientist thinks he has proven that people do not salivate at the thought of food, he obviously never tasted Mrs. Olken’s veal chop.

About the only thing that would make this story even better would be if this were an old family recipe. The truth, however, is that Mrs. Olken turned to one of the more reliable sources of great recipes for her inspiration—Cook’s Illustrated Magazine. Now, I am no cook, but I love reading Cook’s because it explains why things work and how it worked out the recipes it gives us.

For tonight’s meal, she downloaded first the recipe for Pan-Seared Veal Chops and then she followed with the recipes for Cognac and Mustard Pan Sauce and Tarragon-Sherry Cream Sauce For Veal. By combining the two sauce recipes, and don’t ask me how she managed it, she came up with a rich, thick, tasty sauce that was every bit up to partnering with the flavorful bone-in veal rib chop.

Admittedly, these were not some mild, innocuous pieces of veal but tasty yet delicate hunks of protein that are now the best thing that veal can produce since we no longer get milk-fed veal from slaughtered baby cows. It wants a rich yet nuanced wine, and no better wine exists for that job than a fine Pinot Noir. It did not hurt that this evening we were tasting two flights of eight Pinots that included the new 2009s from Freestone. Not only did the Freestone bottlings from its Quarter Moon Vineyard and from its Pastorale Vineyard walk away with top honors in the tasting, but so good were they that they will be retasted for Connoisseurs’ Guide’s highest ratings.

It is nights like this, with wonderful Pinot Noir on the tasting table and dishes like Veal Chops in Mustard Cream Sauce, that make me glad I am in the winewriting business. And if you follow the recipes and pair the results with great Pinot, you will be as satisfied as I am now as I sit here and writing this column.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Back to Nature...Again

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

WARNING: All Winemaking Is Manipulative

Yet another year is drawing to a close, and the journalistic world is fixated on inevitable compilings of hierarchical lists of the best and worst of everything. As far as wine-writing goes, the rush has begun to name top wines, rising stars, notable novas and the most important stories and trends of 2011. The latest Wine Spectator trumpeting the Top 100 wines showed up in my mailbox last week. The same from the San Francisco Chronicle arrived yesterday. Tom Wark posted an insightful piece on the “Top Wine Stories of 2011,” and it is one of his nominees that has set me to thinking.

Tom has, I think rightly, tagged “the mainstreaming of natural wine” as among the year’s significant stories, and it is a topic about which I continue to struggle. Not that I have any problems with the passion of the new crusaders for “natural” and “authentic” wines, I just have difficulty is assessing the aims and parameters of the “movement”. I confess to some confusion as to just what it all means.

Any number of new books on the topic have appeared of late, and it is next to impossible to read through more than a few wine reviews without “authenticity”, “the lack of manipulation” and “the proper expression of terroir” being invoked as the standards by which success can be measured. There are a good many interpretations to be had about what each of these terms means – what is natural to some is abhorrent to others – but what often seems to get lost in the various versions of vinous truth is whether a wine tastes good! Being delicious does not seem to be enough, and, more than once, we hear that warts are just fine so long as a wine adheres to one of many minimalist regimens.

I cannot help but think that there is a certain “back-to-nature” swinging of the pendulum in response to new wine globalism at the root of all this. While I see the point, the scholasticism of authenticity comes with the undisguised notion that something precious has been lost, and that fine hand-crafted wines that speak to place are under the threat of extinction.

Now, maybe I am being naïve, but I do not see the enormous proliferation of simple, mass-market wines as a threat to those wines that I love, nor do I see a landscape scoured clean of skilled and conscientious producers. Quite the contrary, I would argue that there have always been great wines to be had, and that there are more now than ever before. As McDonald’s and Arby’s pose no threat to the French Laundry, Charlie Trotter and such, so too the likes of Yellowtail, Charles Shaw and countless “industrial” wines not about to undermine the standing of Burgundy, Bordeaux, Napa Valley or the Sonoma Coast.

Smaller, singularly thinking, artisan producers abound as never before and with them endless schools of winemaking philosophies and thought. And, those who with some justification would decry the homogenizing influence of cooperate giants like Diageo and Constellation should not forget the brilliant bottlings of Joel Peterson’s Teldeschi Zinfandels, Mondavi’s To Kalon Sauvignon Blanc or Beaulieu’s Georges La Tour Private Reserve Cabernets, to name but a few. Quality has its own voice, and I do not believe that it is dependent on any one set of rules.

It all comes down to what is in the glass be it something made by minimalists or proactive winemakers. Heresy, perhaps, but complex and compelling and delicious are for me what the search is about…philosophy be damned. I do not need to know how the winemakers came to the craft, just when and what epiphanal lights changed their lives, their family lineage or the names of the winery dogs. If a wine has a story to tell, it will tell it. To some extent, all winemaking is manipulative, and I suppose that, short of employing carcinogens or methods that encourage genocide and/or the eco-destruction of dear mother earth, I do not care how a wine is made.

I remember a noted winemaker who had a culinary background addressing my students and likening winemaking to “cooking in big pots.” I like the idea and have long regarded winemakers as chefs. I have had wonderful meals that were the essence of simplicity...quickly seared fresh Ahi, the first corn of summer, the perfect late-season heirloom tomato. I have had others of breathtaking complexity wrought from hours of painstaking work in the kitchen, and I would no more damn and dismiss Thomas Keller and Joel Rebuchon as “manipulators” than I would the skilled artisan in the cellar.

Yes, it does come down to what is in the glass. With that thought in mind, I offer thanks and a year-end salute to winemakers of every stripe, and my toast is with a glass that is half full, not one that is half empty. You’ve got to admit it’s getting better…

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Memories
Robert Lawrence Balzer, 1912-2011

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Mr. Balzer was the first giant of winewriting in the United States. His invention made it possible for me to have a career as publisher of Connoisseurs’ Guide. A fitting tribute to his life as author, newsletter publisher, wine merchant, teacher, center of attention for decades appeared on Friday in WineBusiness.com. Those of you old enough to have known or even to have known of Mr. Balzer should follow the link below. But, more importantly, those of you too young to have known of Mr. Balzer’s incredible role in the early days of the wine recovery post-Prohibition need to follow the link because the story needs to part of your understanding of our business.

http://www.winebusiness.com/news/?go=getArticle&dataid=94887

Friday Fishwrap
Eight Reasons Why Robert Parker Does Not Care

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Picking on Robert Parker has become the latest parlor game for the blogging set. It is great theater, but it has no impact. Here are the reasons why.

-- Mr. Parker does not care what a bunch of writers with far less power, prestige, market presence, financial wherewithal and small weenies think of him. He is the big dog and folks like Jim Budd, Gray Blake, Tom Wark and Charlie Olken are just small tickles in his world and are best ignored. Joe Roberts (1WineDude) is right when he says that nothing we say will get under Mr. Parker’s skin. It will take CNN or 60 Minutes to expose the pay to play scandal that now attaches to the Wine Advocate.

-- To put it another way, other than Marvin Shanken, Mr. Parker is the biggest financial cat in the wine world. His money is secure. His way of life is secure. He is semi-retired because he has made a bundle and is still making a small fortune while letting others do his work. I wouldn’t say that I am jealous, but facts are facts.

-- Jay Miller, who seems to be at the heart of most of the bad news related to the Wine Advocate, must have compromising pictures of Mr. Parker. His overblown ratings are not worthy of attention, his financial arrangements with folks he is supposed to be judging independently and without bias are sleazy at best and unethical in some folks eyes. But Parker never seems to blink an eye. Some snoopy journalist is going to get to the bottom of the Parker-Miller symbiosis one of these days.

-- Parker knows that the newsletter business is not long for this world. He knows he pulled a rabbit out of a hat with his Bordeaux futures coverage three decades ago and shot to the top. He knows his writing is no better than Alan Meadows or Steve Tanzer or CGCW or any of the other independent newsletters. He is just bigger than the rest combined. But he knows that the slick paper magazines with their ability to sell advertising and thus to produce more pages for less money are increasingly going to take over.

-- And he also knows that the competition from a thousand wine bloggers, each of whom is out after his ass for even the slightest misstep, let alone the big missteps of recent years, along with the agglomeration sites like Snooth and Cellar Tracker are simply going to take over the independent end of the business. So, why care when he knows he is running a dying empire.

-- As long as folks like Miller and Parker’s handpicked replacement for himself, Antonio Galloni, can sell their influence for money, it is proof that the power of the Wine Advocate has not waned all that much. Bloggers like Alder Yarrow can write things like “. . . . erodes what little brand equity the Wine Advocate has remaining”, but Parker can barely even hear his or any of the small-time bloggers buzzing.

-- Mr. Parker has seen it all before, and he has beaten it all before. Go ask Alice Feiring. She skewered Parker big-time, earned a few minutes of fame and has dropped back into her niche. Go ask the late Bob Finigan whose newsletter was the big dog for imported wines until Parker came along. Finigan disagreed with Parker and got buried for his sins.

-- Jay Miller is Robert Parker’s love child.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
It’s Lamb Stew Tonight—And Bring Me A Big, Rich Wine With It

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I like savory, long-cooked meats. And I refuse to drink wimpy wines with them.

It seems that the best and quickest way to get an argument started among wine-interested folk these days is to bring up the topic of alcohol. As is the case with any hot-button topic, the debate is rife with silly simplifications that defy reason, and one of the silliest is that high-alcohol wines (14.0% or so seems to be the level above which offense begins) are impossible to drink with food.

A couple of weeks back, I wrote about what I like to call the four “quantifiables” of tannin, alcohol, acidity and sugar that most directly affect a wine’s ability to pair well with one food or another and of just how someone might know which wines were most likely to show which traits. Of the four, the one most easily determined is alcohol…you simply need to look at the label. Now, bearing in mind that the legally required declarations of alcohol do come with fairly liberal plus-or-minus parameters, a quick check of the label can nonetheless give you a fairly good idea as to what to expect.

As a very general guideline, higher alcohols typically predict bigger, bolder wines that want drinking with appropriately richer, more flavorful foods. We have long argued that such wines can be balanced and compelling bottlings in their own rights, and that alcohol in and of itself should never be the sole measure of failure or success. It would be well to remember there are plenty of poorly crafted efforts that seem coarse and hot despite lower levels of alcohol. That said, those whose alcohols begin to edge higher are more likely to favor richness and intensity over refinement and restraint, just as a good many recipes do the same.

Although I am the last to argue for hard and fast rules, I have always thought that the most obvious criterion for a successful wine-and-food pairing was the alignment of relative intensities, that neither the wine nor the food should overpower one or the other. Big flavors on the plate want big flavors from the glass, and a lilting, light-bodied, acid-crisped wine is probably not the thing for matching up with heartier stews and slowly braised meats. Similarly, a very ripe, high-alcohol, powerhouse offering will overwhelm the subtleties of more delicate fare. To damn or praise one wine or the other solely on the basis of its alcohol content, however, seems tantamount to saying that lighter foods are necessarily better or worse than those of substance and spice.

Alcohol numbers do not predict quality, but they can often serve as signposts of style and afford useful clues as to whether a wine speaks in softer tones or with a full-throated voice.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Global Warming No Longer A Threat To California Wine

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Global warming, or “climate change” if you want to be politically correct is a real threat to the wine industry. We rely on the match of location and grape to produce quality wines. The possibility that the relationships we have come to know could be upset by mother nature is disturbing to say the least.

But no longer. Consider this news squib hidden away over the Thanksgiving holiday.

“As you contemplate that Thanksgiving wine you relished on Thursday, ponder for a moment a world too hot to grow fine grapes. Dr. Sanliang Gu does every day.”

For a dozen years his obsession has been to manipulate the growing cycle of grapes around Fresno, California’s hottest and therefore earliest-ripening wine region. This week he succeeded: the 2011 vintage that normally would have been picked in July or August came off the vines two days before Thanksgiving — about three weeks after Napa’s weather-delayed harvest ended”.

Now, I worry about grape manipulation. If Fresno now picks in November, when will coastal vineyards be picked? I like long-hanging fruit as much as the next guy, but January is a little too late for me.

Admittedly, this column is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but only because we do not know the details about the Fresno trials. The topic itself, how to slow down the ripening trend in California vineyards, is not something about which I joke. A way or ways need to be found that will enable us to pick physiologically ripe grapes at lower sugars and thus to make lower alcohol wines.

And while not all wine needs to be low-alcohol or even lower alcohol, it would not hurt the grapes if gambits existed that allow the wineries more choice in how and when grapes ripen than now exists. To date, conversations have focused on rootstocks, yeasts, trellising and water just to name the most talked about. Modified grapes have seemed beyond the range of discussion until now. We need to know more about what happened in Fresno, and we need to know whether delayed ripening has anything to do with ripening at lower Brix levels.

Come to think about it a bit more, I am still worried about climate change.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
On Today’s Wine List

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Happy Thanksgiving to those of you who have the time to check in here today. It is early enough for me to have a few quiet moments before the hoards arrive. We have 35 people sharing the day with us, most of whom come from great distances to be here, including two from England and a batch from the East Coast. This kind of gathering of the Olken clan has been going on for as many years as I can remember. When we were a fairly tight geographic unit growing up in Boston, my Uncle Pete and Aunt Raisy (Rosalie) were the hosts. Now, with the family spread out on both coasts and my wife’s family on her mother’s side mostly in England, there are two such gatherings—one on each side of the country.

I cannot speak to the wines being served back east at my cousin Grace’s house. My suspicion is the Grace and Harold have a less modest cellar than mine, and probably have a more balanced wine purchase budget than mine. Since most of our family are wine drinkers, not wine students, they are likely to be happy no matter what shows up on the table as long as it does not give them a bellyache.

Our guests here in Alameda are no more knowledgeable or demanding than those back east. And, in their diversity lies my dilemma. I understand their palates, and I, of all people, feel the need to serve those palates with care and precision. It would be a lot easier if my mother-in-law were not looking for something sweet while my brother Richard goes in search of the most tannic red he can find. She, the mother-in-law, has been known to drink Port with her tacos. Richard impresses me as having the taste for toothpicks like a woodchuck. And then there are the younger generations. They are mostly drinkers of dry, accessible wines. A good Rosé impresses them as much as a fancy Pinot Noir (typically my first choice).

I will go out to the cellar soon and choose today’s wines, but you already see the outlines of the choices. We will start, of course, with copious quantities of the bubbly. Magnums of Gloria Ferrer Brut and Mumm Napa Brut will be joined by a handful of French bottlings from the likes of Duval-Leroy, Forget-Brimont and grower-producers, Camille Saves and Laherte Freres (a brilliant bubbly Brut Rosé).

I will attempt to fool my mother-in-law into drinking relatively dry wine with the Pinot Gris from J Vineyard, and Richard is going to get his fill of tannin and oak from an us yet unchosen Zinfandel. I like the new D-Cubed offerings or I might reach for the Ravenswood Teldeschi whose fruit is matched by its spice and oak richness. By the time, I tuck into the last bits of the stuffing and gravy, a glass of good Zin even suits my palate. And did I mention fruity Rosé?

Have a great Thanksgiving, everyone. Thanks for checking in.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Too Sad Search For The Perfect Thanksgiving Wine

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Well, Thanksgiving Day is tomorrow, and with it awaits the most problematic meal of the year…from a vinous perspective, that is.

As one whose duties include picking out the “right” wines for dinner, in fact, it sometimes looks like nothing so much as the meal from hell.

Most everyone who has ever written about wine has spent too many hours in making wine recommendations for the traditional Thanksgiving table. I say “too many” because I suspect that most, despite the best of intentions and with complete confidence in their selections, have slowly felt futility overtaking them and in time have come to the realization that this is one damned difficult meal to wrestle with and come out on top.

First, there is just too much going on at the table to find a wine that comfortably fits with everything from the turkey to the stuffing to Aunt Harriet’s marshmallow-topped yams and the ubiquitous cranberry sauce, and then there is the problem of trying to please all of your friends and/or relations. We all know that is simply not going to happen.

I have reached the point that, when asked, I will gladly offer up a few of my favorite wines with Thanksgiving dinner, but I no longer make unsolicited recommendations…or at least, I try not to. I happen to enjoy Sherries with the richer, autumnal flavors of the meal, but the dyspeptic looks and disparaging comments I received when trotting out a prized Amontillado some years back led me to save such bottles for a considerably smaller crowd. I like a big-bodied Chardonnay with turkey, but is usually will fail under the weight of the table’s heavier fare, and, while a good Pinot Noir works with much of the meal, it can get a bit shrill and acidy after a mouthful of a sweeter side dish. I confess utter befuddlement at those who make the annual pitch for Syrah as the ideal wine for Thanksgiving dinner, but, if big, red and tannic is what makes you happy, then who am I to argue. Call the meal a “melting pot” or call it culinary anarchy, but abandon any notion that the perfect wine awaits finding.

Now, heaven forbid, I would not for a minute suggest that we forego wine with the meal, and I hold with those who have come to the conclusion that the solution lies in pulling a good many corks from a wide variety of wines and letting your guests join in the debate. As Charlie mused in yesterday’s posting, a good many wine lovers, myself included, have more wine stashed away than we know what to do with. Well, now just might be the time for a trip to the cellar.

Can you please everyone? Yes, but it might take as many bottles as you have guests, and, who knows, you just might find a new “perfect” wine!

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
My Wine Budget Is Out Of Balance

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Congress has failed in its budgetary responsibilities, and I confess that I have failed in balancing my wine budget. Of course, I got no help from the wineries. They seem to think that I am one of the 1% instead of an honored member of the 99%.

Truth be told, this is not the first year in which my wine budget has run a deficit. I am as profligate with my wine purchases as the Air Force is with its thousand-dollar hammers and toilet seats. I lose money on wine as if I were running the Post Office instead of the Olken check book. I hemorrhage my Pinot purchase funds at a rate that makes the depletion of the Social Security Trust Fund look like child’s play. Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae have nothing on me.

Some day, in the next several decades when I leave this life behind for an eternity in the Elysian Fields, my children will get no inheritance. I will have spent it all on wine. I have fallen victim to a Ponzi scheme of my own making, and I cannot blame Bernie Madoff.

Let me ask you, please. Has this ever happened to you? Have you ever looked at the stack of wine in your basement or bottom of the coat closet or wine chest and wondered where it all came from? How did those boxes multiply like rabbits on “speed”?

I have.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Russian River Valley AVA—Too Big To Fail or Just Too Big

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If you think that the AVA system was supposed to be a boon to consumers, think again. The Russian River Valley AVA was just expanded by 15,000 acres are the request of one very powerful winery.

Not one consumer was involved in initiating this further expansion of an area already too large to have significant meaning in terms of grape-growing conditions and wine results. And while the expansion is not going to make much difference given the current state of play, it simply is the wrong result.

It is one thing to have large area AVAs like North Coast or San Francisco Bay or Central Coast or any of the generalized, multi-county designations. They are essentially meaningless and very few consumers are lulled into buying wines with those appellations. While there are important wines with North Coast, for example, on their labels, I would guess that very few people buy Schramsberg because it uses that appellation rather than California, as, say, Chandon does.

Names like Napa Valley or Russian River Valley, however, do come with serious, commercially advantageous cachet, and that is why those designations have been sought after and allowed to include land and microclimates that are so diverse that there is simply no reliable way for the consumer to know what they mean in real terms.

For proof, I offer you the comments of a winery that shall remain nameless for the moment until it actually carries out its cynical plan. The size of the Russian River Valley AVA, already so big that it is failing consumers, has encouraged a winery in the warm area east of Highway 101, with vineyards suited to varieties like Cabernet Sauvignon and its friends, to contemplate planting Pinot Noir. It is not that the location is in a suitable microclimate for Pinot Noir. It is not and the winery owner knows it.

The winery has hatched this plan because, as the winery owner said without so much as bit of concern, it is in the Russian River Valley AVA and Russian River Pinot Noir sells and sells and sells because most of it is planted in much cooler parts of the AVA and has acquired a well-earned reputation for quality. Ultimately, of course, quality will win out, but that is seemingly not a concern to those who would plant Pinot Noir is the wrong places in order to take advantage of its economic potential under an AVA name that is now too large.

The Russian River Valley is not alone in this situation, and, frankly, the recent expansion adds territory that is more like the majority of the AVA than the warm north end of its reach up towards Healdsburg or to the east into an overlapping AVA known as Chalk Hill. The same “too large” tag can, should and has been hung on the Napa Valley AVA. But, at least in the Napa Valley, there are more than a dozen overlapping, small area AVAs that have more meaning as to wine character and thus to the consumer than currently exists within the 150,000 acres of the Russian River Valley.

I know what should be done to correct this misleading situation. AVAs that are too large should be either scrapped entirely or should be overlain with meaningful smaller districts. And since doing away with such names as Napa Valley and Russian River Valley is simply not going to happen, then the next best thing is too encourage the good folks in the Russian River Valley to get on with their occasional discussions of smaller, more tightly defined areas.

Russian River Valley—please be encouraged. I like my Westside Road Pinot Noir and I understand that it is very different from what is grown in Freestone or along the Gravenstein Highway. Give us some meaningful geographic delimitations. You are now all grown up, and it won’t hurt a bit.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Grade Inflation Is Destroying Wine Ratings

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

When I was growing up on the mean streets of Boston, if one got an 80 in a class, that was an “honors grade”. Get all 80s and above and you were on the Honor Roll. Average 85 and you made the National Honor Society. Not only that, you were a candidate for Harvard.

Today in California, if a student does not get all As, that student is virtually frozen out of the University of California system and most other leading institutions of higher learning. Apparently, the concept of grade inflation did not start with wine writers.

And I don’t solely blame my colleagues for their excesses. I also blame the retailers, the wineries and, ultimately, the consumers. You see, here is how it works. The more high grades one gives, the more wines one’s readers get excited about. But the readers do come last in this equation. It is the industry that pants after, that lusts for, that has been known to beg for scores in the 90s. And there are some in the industry who will cut off the supply to winewriters if their scores are not high enough. Never mind that reputable critics taste blind and call them the way they see them.

As one winery said to me when I rated its Chardonnay at 88 points, which is a recommendation on the CGCW scale, “You don’t like our style”. The wine had just outpointed over half the California Chards being reviewed, and it was recommended, but the winery argued vociferously that we did “not like the style” and stopped sending us wine. Last year, a winery sent us nine Zinfandels. We recommended five of the nine, a recommendation rate for that winery of 55%. A typical Zin issue sees us recommended 35-40% of the wines tasted. But we panned one wine, and that apparently so enraged the owner of the winery that he sent a slew of angry emails, the final one of which vowed never to speak to CGCW again.

The consumers come into play here as well. It is an insidious game because everyone wants higher scores. Readers want the critics to agree with them. Try giving an 85 to someone’s fancy White Burg purchase or their favorite expensive Barossa Shiraz or Russian River Pinot and see how fast the letters come in. Try getting a winery’s attention if you constantly rate their $50 Cabernet in the 80s. See how fast the retailers rush to ignore you if you do not recommend wines in ways that help them sell the wines on their shelves. It is more than economic self-interest. It is delusional to think that raising all scores will mean anything of significance.

Here’s an honest to goodness real letter, in part, “I love Connoisseurs’ Guide but couldn’t you find a way to say nicer things about the wines you review?”. In this case, it was not just the points that were a problem but the fact that we were not cheerleading for every wine that comes across the transom. Never mind that we might have liked the wines, we were mentioning the downsides in some wines we were recommending. That is what good criticism is supposed to be all about. It is supposed to tell the whole truth as the critic sees it, not just the good part of the truth.

That retailer was not alone in his reaction to our words. The idea that CGCW was not sufficiently leading the sales charge has been voiced over and over again by wineries that like us. The ones that do not like us no longer talk to us. That list is long and getting longer. I tell the wineries that I don’t care what they think. We buy a lot of the wines we taste so when a winery like Iron Horse will not even return phone calls, we are happy to buy its wines and review them anyhow.

Still, before I get too far afield, I need to come back to writers. Recently, the exceptional wine blog, Fermentation, authored by the inestimable Tom Wark, toted up the percentages of California Pinots getting 90 points or better from Robert Parker. For 2009, admittedly a fine vintage, 78% of all wines rated in the 90s. That is an astonishing percentage. Good for California.

But, folks, that kind of analysis turns out to be no analysis at all. When everything is equal, there is no differentiation upon which consumers can rely. We have heard the same thing said before. How was Parker going to be able to rate the 2009 Bordeaux vintage when he had been averaging in the mid-90s for earlier vintages this decade. There were a few tongue-in-cheek comments that he would finally break the 100-point barrier. He didn’t. But, how does one choose between 94 and 96 when so many wines earn those ratings.

I don’t mean to pick on Mr. Parker or his crony in grade inflation, Jay Miller, or Harvey Steiman or Jim Laube or anyone else. Wine is better than ever before, and there is truly less flawed wine out there on the hustings. But when winewriting begins to call everything “great”, it is also saying that everything is average. And I don’t believe it for a minute. There are always wines that are head and shoulders better than their peers. With grade inflation, however, those beauties cannot stand out like they should.

I disagree with the folks who would do away with the 100-point system. It would only get replaced by some other system of symbolic notation. But, it does seem that there is something wrong when all the wines are rated “great”. They simply cannot be. There are always standouts. And it is time for the industry and the consumers to insist that those superstars be allowed to have some breathing room between their ratings and those afforded to wine in the big middle ground.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Chinese Affinity For Red Bordeaux—The Proverbial “Bull In A China Shop”

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A marriage made in heaven? Or a culture clash? I know my answer.

One of the obvious truths that struck me early in my wine-and-food education is the close affinity regional wines have with regional cuisines…oysters with the bracing cool-climate whites of the western Loire, the charcuterie of Alsace with Gewurztraminer and Riesling, the rich and rustic dishes of Southern France with the savory Red wines of the Rhone…well, you get the idea. It is just common sense, really. As I have on numerous occasions reminded my culinary students, if you want a good idea about what food might pair well with a given wine, just look at the popular foods found in the region where the wine is grown. Yes, it makes sense to me.

How then, do you explain China’s utter infatuation with red Bordeaux? I mean the people in China eat Chinese Food! I was a “China Watcher” in my younger years. I spent much of my undergraduate education and a good many years of graduate school studying modern Chinese history, so I am intimately familiar and have a very long love affair with Chinese cuisine. I eat it and I cook it…and experience has taught me that high-tannin Cabernet, or big reds of most any kind, are not pleasant partners to classic Chinese cuisine. What that says to me is that the Chinese have a lot to learn…either that, or that they are not drinking First-Growth Claret and Grand Cru Côtes de Nuits reds with dinner.

Now, most everyone who follows the business of fine wine is aware of the profound effect that China has had of late on the prices of some of the world’s greatest and most collectable wines. China, in fact, seems to be singular in their support of top-end Bordeaux, but, it has been claimed, that the interest seems less driven by true wine appreciation and more by the pursuit of prestige. I have more than once seen statistics that indicate that the vast majority of fine wine purchased in China is by way of gifts of status, and that those sales spike around certain holidays.

The daily drinking of wine with meals even in wealthier urban centers is far from commonplace, and I do not expect to see regular wine consumption to be part of rural life in China for many years, if ever. I would argue, however, that if China is to ever become a wine-drinking nation, then it will not be big-bodied reds that pave the way.

The weightier, high-protein dishes that mesh so well with such wines are simply not on the menu. The big hunks of expensive-to-raise-meats that require vast pasture lands simply do not exist in a country where most of whose arable land reached full use some six or seven hundred years back. Bits of beef, lamb, chicken and pork deftly married with vegetables and complexly seasoned and sauced, an occasional whole fish or lobster or duck, perhaps, but, while I confess to relishing great Pinots with classic Peking Duck, there is no Boeuf Bourguignon, no Entrecote Bordelaise, no Yankee Pot Roasts to soak up the tannins and soften the astringency of hefty red wines.

I would also argue that great Chinese food is one of the most complex and intricately balanced of all the world’s cuisines. Every ingredient seems to be perfectly fit, and if one piece is out of place, then the whole dish collapses, and big wines, and that includes whites like ripe, oaky Chardonnay, too often behave like the proverbial “bull in the china shop” and cause a cacophonous mess.

So, what to drink? It has become fairly trite to rush to Riesling, but trite answers usually become so for a reason. Great Riesling is itself a remarkably balanced, wonderfully fine-tuned wine, and it rarely hits with the in-your-face-force of the Cabernet/Chardonnay/Syrah gang. Riesling’s remarkable tension of sugar and acid seems to balance the sweet/sour/spicy aspects found in so much of Chinese cuisine, and it will not upset the balance of the delicate seafood dishes of the south coast. I have had good success with some of the slightly sweet Chenin Blancs of Vouvray and Touraine, and good Gewurztraminer, if not too soft and sweet, is still a good fit with mildly spicy fare. Sparkling wines, as long as they are not overly austere and acidic, can work wonderfully as well, and, if not likely to wow, most mannerly whites will get the job done.

It will be most interesting to see how the China’s taste for wine evolves over the next decade or so.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
The Blog As Pot Stirrer

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A good wine blog may be many things—story teller, wine channeler, future predictor. Sometimes, it also has to challenge the status quo.

Last week, Steve Heimoff created a bit of a stir with his laments that wine-blogging might be going the way of sensational tabloids. Well, as commented on by a few of his readers and an absolute truth from where I sit, a bit of “sensationalism” might be expected in trying to attract readers when each and every day in the wine business is far from exciting and slow news days abound. What’s the big deal?

I do not see that the vast bulk of blogging has ever had anything to do with news, education or fine expository prose. Blogging, I think, is far more about thinking out loud and about the airing of opinion. Of making yours known and letting other folks know when they are so clearly wrong. There is a lot of fist-shaking-at-the sky going on precisely because there is precious little real “news” to be had. And, when something of some significance happens in the vinous world, say Mr. Parker’s abdication of responsibility for reporting on California wines or the state of California’s recently concluded harvest, the blogosphere swings into action and quickly beats the newly arrived horse to death.

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are some very interesting voices and some fine thinking to be found out here in the electronic ether, but the din of axes being continually ground threatens at times to make those voices harder to hear. It is a lot like the crowded world of those dispensing wine advice, the one in which I live, you gradually start making decisions about to whom and to whom not to listen.

I appreciate the efforts of all who would take the time to blog even if they have absolutely nothing to say, and inane blather scares me far less than the idea that there should be rules and regulations and “standards” about topic, technique or talent. Scarier yet are the folks who make them. The world of blogging is about as laissez-faire an endeavor as exists even if some seem to think of it in more proprietary terms.

Nobody is forced to partake. Nobody is forced to listen and what is or is not of value is up to the reader. I feel no need to ridicule those whom I think are Internet fools. I am quite content to ignore them. And, if it turns out that they develop a large and loyal following, I can always sit to the side in the smug certainty that I know more than they do.

Blogging that matters will be recognized for what it is, and those voices that do have something to say will be heard. There will always be exceptions, and, because there are few “absolutes” in our business, there will be plenty of opposing opinions, but I still have faith in the notion that the cream will rise to the top—when, if you will forgive the mixed metaphor, it is stirred appropriately.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
The Rick Perry Gaffe—I’ve Got The Wine Angle

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

We all make mistakes. Sometimes we mistake a Bordeaux for Burgundy and sometimes we confuse Syrah with Pinot Noir. Those are mistakes of commission. They happen within a larger context and are mistakes of judgment.

What happens when we make mistakes in knowledge? What happens when we think Shiraz, the Aussie version of Syrah, got its downunder monicker because the grape was originally cultivated in ancient Persia. Not true, of course. What happens when we think we have the real Syrah growing in California’s vineyards only to find out that what we really have is “son of Syrah”, and it is only a half chip off the old block. Not good, but we recover—even if it took Petite Sirah about two decades to get over the insults once we found out that it was half Peloursin.

We all make mistakes. Rick Perry was asked to identify the Departments of the U. S. Government that he would do away with and he couldn’t. I misspelled Riesling the first time I wrote about it. Lots of letters and one red face ensued. Not so long ago, a writer friend of mine wrote an article about Tuscany and mentioned Nebbiolo as a grape that was grown prominently there. Not so, of course. It all comes back to what we have been talking about this week.

You need knowledge to talk knowingly about a subject. Anybody can run for President. Anybody can be a winewriter. Anybody can practice medicine without a license. I did just yesterday when I cured my granddaughter’s headache by telling her that I was not going to take her to soccer practice if she was not feeling up to it. But, just as that bit of trickery and the occasional aspirin are the extents of my medical practice, so too should folks who espouse false theories about wine know their limits. Mr. Perry, who by all accounts is a popular Governor in his state, wound up beyond his knowledge level last night. It happens to us all at some point. I prefer a little humility in my politicians and my winewriters because we all make mistakes.

Sometimes, it is role of this and other blogs to look at the mistakes of commission and omission. I hope we don’t forget the names of the grapes in our bailiwick, but sooner or later, we are going to mistake a Cab for a Pinot Noir. It won’t mean that we don’t know the difference any more than Mr. Perry’s momentary brain outage means that he does not understand government. Mistakes happen. We will keep pointing out those made by others when we see them—as we did the other day in our comments about varietal identification. Some folks may not like it, but there is a price to be paid of the mistakes of hubris just as there is a price to be paid for the mistakes of brain outages. The one thing we can promise you about this blog. It will not be used to announce our run for President.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Oh, For The Love of Tannin—And The Foods That Go With It

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

When it comes to successful food and wine pairing, a few simple guidelines go a long way in ensuring success. I talked about just that in last Wednesday’s posting and was rightly reminded that my seemingly elementary advice to pay attention to the “quantifiables” of tannin, acidity, sugar and alcohol presupposed some basic knowledge of what the tannin, acid, etc., levels in a given wine might be presumed to be, and that without said knowledge, the whole notion of food and wine pairing is problematic to a good many consumers.

I could not agree more, and, while my “three-minute” primer was momentarily satisfactory to my inquisitive Millennial daughter, a few prerequisite words on the fundamentals might make it more useful yet. Today’s musings about tannin will be the first of several short pieces addressing just what those “quantifiables” are and in which wines they are most likely to play a defining role.

Tannin is that astringent, puckery, palate-drying stuff that seems to suck the saliva from your mouth. It is often described as being bitter, but its effects are almost more of feel than of flavor. It is notably found in over-brewed tea, walnut skins and under ripe fruit (most particularly in persimmons), and it is found in red wine to greater or lesser extent depending on varietal type.

While tannin levels might vary according to winemaker whim, Cabernet Sauvignon, Nebbiolo, Petite Sirah and Syrah are generally those wines most influenced by tannin, and red meats and rich cheeses are their most comfortable foils. The fats in such foods will coat the taste buds and lessen tannin’s astringent effects, and tannin will bind with protein in a way that makes them less austere in taste. High acidity in foods will conversely amplify tannin’s puckery proclivities as will overt sweetness. Fish oils combine with tannin to create bitter, somewhat medicinal flavors, although recent research suggests that elevated iron content in wine might also explain the effect.

Malbec, Merlot, Zinfandel, Grenache, Sangiovese and Cabernet Franc (depending where grown) are usually more moderate in tannin and a little easier to match with milder meats and richer vegetarian fare, although Sangiovese can surprise as in the case of burly, high-tannin Tuscans such as Brunello and Vino Nobile. The tannins in Pinot Noir are typically more temperate yet thus affording a wider range of dinnertime options from lamb and pork to meaty fish, and the Gamay grape of Beaujolais yields quaffable wines that are as close to tannin free as red wine will get.

There are those who like tannin for tannins sake and others who abhor even its slightest presence, but do bear in mind that tannin will diminish as a wine ages. It is, in fact, a key antioxidant that keeps red wine from becoming acetic as it slowly develops over time. The point, by the way, of aging fine red wine is not to get rid of its tannin, but to make the wine more complex and involving. Tannin is the protector that helps makes lengthy keeping possible.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Doing The Knowledge

Tue, 08 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It takes four years to become a London taxi driver through a process of learning the City’s geography called “Doing The Knowledge”. How long does it take to become a winewriter?

Unlike London cabbies, there are no tests for winewriters. One does not have to know anything. A good line of patter and a bit of bluster has taken many so-called winewriters a long way. I know. It did for me.

But there is an essential difference. I knew I was a rank amateur when I started. And I knew I could succeed because I was entering a part of the winewriting field that was more or less empty at the time. Along with Earl Singer, my office mate in our day jobs, and my writing partner at the time, I walked into the California beat and Connoisseurs’ Guide was thus born with little or no competition. Of course, there was little cost of entry either, and soon there were lots of others who turned their passions into their vocations.

Over time, winewriting went from small-time, cottage industry publications to the massive, full-color, hundreds of pages of advertising magazines whose budget for each issue dwarfs what CGCW spends in a year. With the exception of the Wine Advocate, the newsletter field was then and is now, small potatoes no matter how much I or Steve Tanzer or Dan Berger or Nick Ponomareff know.

And then the Internet came along. The cost of entry and the amount of knowledge needed to play had gone up—even for newsletters—and there have been no new entrants to the field of any consequence for years now. Writers who came to the biz with a good consumer base of information quickly built their credentials through tasting and travel. And it is fair to say that magazines like the Spectator and the Enthusiast are now peopled by professionals, not just excited amateurs. Neither they nor I had a road map to follow, and so “Doing The Knowledge” for us was very different than it is for London cabbies who still spend years riding around town on their mopeds with their learner’s permits proudly displayed. We got to be professionals by paying attention.

Nowadays, sommeliers have to have a credential if only to be respected by other sommeliers. English writers are either too old to get a credential or they are so young that they spend years searching for their MWs (Masters of Wine) in a process that is even more arcane than learning every road, alley, hotel, nook and cranny of the city.

But the Internet, that bastion of democracy that let’s every voice be heard, has lowered the bar again for winewriters. Today, we have a new generation of commentators and observers, recommenders and story tellers who are “doing the knowledge” the same way I did it—on the job. I was among the lucky early entrants. I may not have known what I did not know, but there were so few others in my “space” that it was easy to be “knowledgeable”. Not so today.

The result is that we have far more information than every before, but we have far less insight, far less perspective in that great mass of writing. And we are going to have to wait while all those new entrants “Do The Knowledge”. Whether they will change winewriting forever still remains to be seen. For the moment, they remind me of me decades ago as I struggled to learn about wine faults, went out in the field and wrote article after article about the fine points of small appellations even before they were recognized, tasted with as many winemakers as could be found, interviewed every person who would sit still for an hour.

I have come to this point of talking about knowledge because of the intellectual challenges inherent in the arguments pro and con in yesterday’s blog. For that was the very crux of the discussion. It was about knowledge and the application of that knowledge. It was about what makes important winewriting important. We were talking about the understanding of small differences in wine—because it is those understandings that allow us to separate one wine from another. Yesterday’s blog, despite its tongue-in-cheek kidding of my friend Dan Berger, was not about his palate or mine. It was about “The Knowledge”. Because it is “The Knowledge” that makes us into connoisseurs. We may disagree about styles and about individual wines, but those with “The Knowledge” recognize, understand, can explain the small differences that make wine appreciation so very much worthy of our time and attention.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
My Running Argument With Dan Berger
—In Which I Prove Him Wrong Again

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Dan Berger is a friend of mine. Really. But sometimes friends can disagree, and that is how it is in wine and with Dan and me.

This time, he has written a column saying that he cannot tell red wine varieties apart anymore. I think he is wrong. I think his palate is far more discerning than that. In fact, I am sure of it. I have tasted wine with Dan plenty of times, and I have great respect for his palate—perhaps more than he does if one judges by his latest comments.

He writes, “In the 1990s as alcohol levels for most red wines rose in response to higher scores from some people who believed that the ‘best’ wines were the biggest. By the late 1990s, we were seeing red wine alcohols in the 14.5 percent to 16 percent range; previously most red wines were 12 percent to 13.5 percent, and most wine lovers had been fine with that. But newer consumers, notably those who read scores as facts, believed that the best wines had loads of alcohol.

Higher alcohols are the result of far more sugar in the grapes at harvest than previously, indicating that the grapes were harvested later than in the past. And the later that red grapes are harvested, the less they show the distinctive varietal character for which we once lusted”.

Let’s agree that there is some truth in what Dan says. There are wines whose ripeness levels obliterate the grape’s varietal character. No one would argue otherwise. But that is not what Dan wrote. Dan argues that wines over 13.5% alcohol, especially those above 14.5%, are not liked for their character but for their high ratings given by writers who apparently prefer alcohol to varietal character. This is not a new claim for Dan, of course, but it is so blatantly disprovable that it needs to be debunked.

So, let’s turn to one of my favorite winewriters for proof. I refer you, of course, to Dan Berger. You see, in the midst of his long treatises on riper wines, Dan has recommended plenty of wines with alcohol levels at and above 14.5%. My favorite was his full and complete backing for Shafer Merlot. Now, don’t misunderstand me. Dan was right about the wine. He likes it, and I like it. Shafer Merlot continues to be a well-defined, rich, supple, structured wine with very specific Merlot character—with alcohol levels approaching and extending beyond 15%.

In point of fact, every wine that Shafer makes has alcohols near to and above 15%, yet no one I know of who has a reasonably solid acquaintance with varietal character, and certainly not Dan whose palate is actually razor sharp, would mistake Shafer Merlot for Shafer Cabernet Sauvignon or for Shafer’s remarkable, precise yet powerful Syrah. Back in the day when Shafer was making a very fine and very ripe Sangiovese, a famous Italian winemaker from the Chianti region identified that it was an Italian while sitting in a Connoisseurs’ Guide tasting.

I like Dan Berger. Really. But I don’t get why he feels the necessity to make pronouncements that are so easily disproved. We could go on and on and on with examples—the various, very ripe wines from Dehlinger, the clearly distinctive varietal bottlings of DuMOL, the wines of Dierberg and Morgan and Siduri and Robert Mondavi and Ridge.

Sadly, this is just another in the string of “judge wines by its label statements, not by its character” arguments. I get Dan’s preference, but when he starts praising Shafer Merlot, a wine that clearly is high in ripeness and gets some of its character from that ripeness, then he disproves his own premise.

It’s a funny thing about wine. When we judge it by what is in the bottle rather than by what is on the label, we come to all kinds of truths. And if we would allow ourselves to know those truths, they will set us free.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
BLIND FAITH: A Critique of Comparative Blind Tasting

Fri, 04 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“We have to recognize that critics will disagree about wines. There is an assumption that if critics are all equally experienced and competent, they will come to the same conclusion. That’s not how it is”.

So argued English writer Jamie Goode earlier this week when questioning how a panel of wine professionals could have chosen Chile’s Sena as superior to its storied French counterparts from Bordeaux. Not all critics are created equal, and Goode advises, “you have to choose which voices you will follow”.

I very much believe that Mr. Goode’s summary advice about seeking out the opinions to which you do or do not listen to is to be heeded. And he goes further with this observation buried in the article—a view that is perhaps even more provocative and more intriguing than any opinion about which wine was or was not the best. Goode asserts that “many wine professionals are poor and/or inexperienced blind tasters.”

Now, there are all kinds of wine “professionals” who cannot wait to tell you what they think. There are retailers, writers, sommeliers, wholesalers, public relations firms, winery reps and winemakers, and, as their businesses are different, so too are their agendas and respective points of view. I do not think that blind tasting is germane to them all. I do not necessarily think that it is important that they all are accomplished blind tasters, and that is as good thing as I count among friends a few whose abilities as blind tasters are nothing less than incomprehensible to me.

When it comes to the job of being a wine critic, however, of recommending and describing wines for an inquisitive public, I know of no more important tool than comparative blind tasting.

Not all wine writers are “critics”, but that is, in fact, our own little niche in the professional wine world. Charlie and I taste blind, day in and day out. It is the methodology in which we believe. We like a good story and will occasionally try to tell one, but that is not our principal focus. We are interested in what is in the bottle. We do not construct tales about this or that winemaker, of how they came to winemaking, the grand architecture or spectacular view from their winery, or their innovative new ways of making wine. We do not spend our time invoking some model of what wine was in some mythical golden age, and we do not spend our time wringing our hands about motive, manipulation and philosophical failure.

For us, it is about the wine. We open bottles, taste what is inside and offer up our opinions… nothing less, nothing more. We strive as much as possible to be impartial, and comparative blind tasting goes a very long way towards achieving that end.

One hears arguments to abandon blind tasting as useless, and I suspect that I will hear some here, but I have yet to encounter one that made a great deal of sense. I am always willing to listen. There are writers that proudly proclaim they have never tasted blind, but I see nothing in those claims about which to be particularly proud. None of us is wholly lacking in bias. Absolute objectivity only exists outside some Platonic cave. But, I would argue, there are also a good many things, some quantifiable, about which wine-lovers will agree, and there are ways to minimize the subjectivity that always threatens. I do not want to see labels. I do not want to know prices. I admit that I have favorite producers, and I tend to like expensive wine. I worry that if it is expensive I will find a way to like it, and I am fully aware that there are certain wine “styles” that I prefer over others.

I would agree with those who make the case that knowing a wine’s history, of how it is made and how it has historically has developed in bottle are important concerns and cannot be ignored. Still, the leveling field of experienced blind tasting seems to me to be the next best thing to objectivity when it comes to comparisons and hierarchical ranking as to what we believe is lesser, good, better and best. It will do until something more precise comes along.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Give Me Three Minutes—I’ll Give You The World of Wine and Food Pairings

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I know what works for me. And I can tell you in three minutes. Whether these guidelines will work for you is a different kettle of fish. It can’t hurt you to listen, however.

My favorite comfort food, Spaghetti Bolognese, was on the menu last night here at home, and as the pasta was boiling, I figured that it was high time to think about which of the several dozen bottles strewn about the kitchen would be the right one for dinner. Barbera? Dolcetto? Zinfandel? All looked appealing, but this night, the new Gary Farrell 2009 Sonoma County Selection Zinfandel got the call, and a most tasty match it turned out to be.

While I stood and considered the options, my twenty-something daughter who is developing a keen interest in things vinous asked the simple question, “how do you know which wine to pick?” Now, my simple answer would be “experience”, but I knew that her question was serious one, so rather than earn a dyspeptic look and a sarcastic comment along the lines of “yeah, that does me a lot of good”, I thought it would be wiser to choose my words with care. At the same time, I also knew that I could easily put a damper on the evening by turning into Professor Eliot. I mean, it was pasta night, after all!

“It’s not all that hard to find something that will work, if you start with a few basic principles,” I began and followed with what I hoped were a few quick and useful words about what I call the “quantifiables” in wine that I consider when making an educated guess about which wine will comfortably accompany which food. They are tannin, acidity, sugar and alcohol.

Tannin, the compound responsible for red-wine astringency is amplified and made particularly puckery by acidity in foods, and it takes on a bitter, medicinal aspect when matched up with fish oils. It is, however, tamed by meat fats and proteins.

High acid wines do a nice job in cleansing the palate and cutting through fats and creamy sauces, but I have never found much pleasure in pairing acid with acid and so avoid such wines with tangy dishes.

Sweetness is easy. You either like it or not, but beware of combining very dry, tannic reds with sugary dishes. It can make for a most bitter and acrimonious marriage.

Alcohol is a tougher call, and, while elevated alcohol does not necessarily mean a wine is hot and out of balance, it does signal that plenty of substance and body are to be expected and that delicate dishes might be best avoided.

Other than these simple concerns, common sense compels that you should try to keep things balanced as far as the relative intensities of any given food and wine go, and that ideally neither should overpower the other.

I cannot say that by working within these very wide lines I have had what I would call a bad food-and-wine match in a very long time. Perfect matches? Well, that is subjective stuff and will always depend on the eye of the beholder. Some have been better that others, and, on occasion, there have been some really stunning combinations that I can recall with clarity for years. It is easy enough to steer clear of disaster, but just how good a match might be is ultimately discovered only in the doing. And, that, after all, is the fun of food and wine pairings.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Time For New Alcohol Labeling Rules

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

What you read on wine labels has always been a little misleading, but nothing is more out of touch and out of date than the requirements for alcohol labeling.

The Government of these United States requires all kinds of statements on wine labels. Whether any of them make sense, or make enough sense, has always been a subject of debate. Yet, in this era of increased scrutiny of alcohol levels in wine, the alcohol statement itself is just about meaningless in its current guise.

There are several things wrong with what our Government allows, and none is more frustrating to me personally than the tiny, non-contrasting type size that wineries get away with. If the alcohol statement is so very important, then why are wineries allowed to hide it?

The second bother is the rather new way in which wineries are allowed to place their tiny, non-contrasting alcohol statements sideways on the label in the most obscure location they can find. Nothing else on the label can be stated sideways. Not the winery name or the appellation or the vintage or the variety. Yet, the alcohol statement gets different treatment. Some wise person will know doubt tell us that the reason has to do with European labeling requirements—to which I say, we do not live in Europe. If the alcohol statement is so important, then why are wineries allowed to hide it?

The third thing that bugs me about alcohol labeling is the wide latitude that wineries are given in what they say on the label. If the alcohol statement is so important, then the current set of regulations that allows a 1 ½ per cent range from the actual truth is simply absurd. It caters to lazy wineries that do not want to do the needed testing. It caters to wineries that mislead by bottling several versions of wines under a non-changing label even though the wine itself is changing. And it caters to wineries that intentionally understate the alcohol in their wines because they afraid of the truth.

And, while it is true that the allowed range for wines above 14% alcohol is 1%, that 1% is still far too wide and is used by wineries for the all the reasons cited above. Indeed, in today’s marketplace with so much emphasis on alcohol level, whether that emphasis is overblown (as I believe that it is) or not, wineries have added reason to misstate the alcohol despite knowing exactly what the level is.

It comes down to this. If the alcohol statements on wine labels are important consumer information, then those statements need to be a lot more accurate and a lot more visible than they are today. If they are not important, then the regulations should not exist. But this fiction that the statements are important but the legibility of them is not makes a mockery of those statements. The wineries are laughing up their sleeves, and the consumer are forced into an absurd search for tiny print in non-contrasting color put sideways into the most obscure locations that wineries can find.

Here are a few simple proposals.

Wineries should be required to use a standard testing procedure for each wine and given that the existing procedures do have margins of error, the allowed variation in the label statement should be 0.2 per cent.

Wineries should be required to put the alcohol level on the label in standard location. I personally prefer the bottom of the front label but could live with the bottom of the back label.

The alcohol statement should be of a size that is easily readable. Because we make a note of the alcohol statement for each and every one of the thousands of wines we taste every year, we have taken to having a magnifying glass present in order to decipher some of the most egregiously cynical of those statements.

The wineries are going to complain about these recommendations, yet if one looks behind those complaints, and we have heard them all before, each of their counterarguments is blatantly anti-consumer. Winery labeling regulations are not for the wineries’ benefit. If we have learned anything about consumer protection, it is that the consumers’ needs should be driving the regulations, not those of the industry—no matter how much we love its products and are willing to spend on them.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
How Long, Oh Lord, How Long?

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I picked up Decanter Magazine this morning and laughed out loud. The headline reads, “New Elegant Australia” and the picture on the cover is of a Molly Dooker wine with an alcohol level that would poison half the sommeliers in San Francisco.

Indeed, every single Shiraz recommended in Decanter is 14% alcohol and higher. There are restaurants in San Francisco that would not put one of those wines on their lists because each and every one of them violates the sacred “no wine over 14% rule” to which the herd mentality in these parts now subscribes.

The question that arises is this: Are the San Francisco wine snob set out of touch or have the English lost their minds? I think I have the answer. The “wine must be low-alcohol” crowd are not leaders. They are followers. They follow each other and they talk to each other. And in so doing, they miss the point. It is not that wines like Aussie Shiraz are bad or that ripe Napa Cabs are bad or that all Chardonnay is overripe, overoaked and lacking in acidity. It is that the herd mentality now makes it impossible for these folks to taste with an open mind.

For that, as usual, we have to turn to the English whose words on wine have always been way ahead of the rest of the English speaking world. And now that the English have told us that 16% alcohol wine is elegant, you can count on a turn in the herd thinking (although I predict it will take a few years to fully take hold) that will also recognize “elegance” in ripe California wines.

It has always been there, of course. Wine like Spottswoode Cabernet and Dehlinger Pinot Noir and Ridge Geyserville and Ramey Chardonnay and HdV everything are all over 14% alcohol, are all excoriated for it by the herd and all have been and remain well-made, balanced, focused, ageworthy and superb.

Many of us have known this truth despite the herd and the writers for papers like the San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times telling us otherwise. Many of us have known this truth despite famous sommeliers writing books that tell us how wrong we are.

Now, it is time for the herd to admit that it has gone way over the top in its use of labels as points of judgment, and, like the English, to taste wine, not labels.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
The Real Truth About The Wine News

Thu, 27 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I was awoken this morning at 5:30 by yet another small but sharp earthquake. And it has made me grumpy. So, I am going to tell you the real truth about the wine news. And then take an antacid.

You see, the wine news is almost sunny, rosy and reads like a series of public relations releases. And, to our discredit, the writers too often believe what they hear. We are, after all, not shown those parts of the vineyards where the grapes have turned to moldy mush or have simply failed to ripen or were left so long in the hope that they would ripen that they no longer have any acidity but they do have high pHs. We don’t often get those bits of truth from the wineries.

Well, it turns out that 2011 is so bad that some winemakers have begun to tell the truth. “Half my crop is gone and half of the other half is moldy”. “Carneros was very bad. It was a petrie dish for rot”. There is more, of course, but it is not the bad news that is being shared that interests me. It is the bad news that is being papered over as if bad news never happens that is the focus of today’s dyspepsia. To wit:

ITEM 1: “Our cool-climate Syrah offers the most flavor intensity”
Now, don’t get me wrong. I like cool-climate Syrah when it is done right. And by “done right”, I mean that the grapes got ripe enough to have that distinctive Syrah blackberry fruit aligned with the variety’s equal distinctive seasonings of pepper and roasted meats. But when a winery touts its underripe grapes as a virtue, and, in fact has made wine lemonade because the acidities are simply tooth-tinglingly screechy, then it is time to blow the whistle. The truth is that underripe is underripe, and no amount of “papering over” changes that fact.

ITEM 2: “The Sale and Use of Cork Closures Continues To Surge”
Now, don’t get me wrong. I am a big fan of true cork closures when they are done right. And by “done right”, I mean that the manufacturers take the time and care in their production to reduce the incidences of “cork taint”, that moldy smell that once invaded somewhere between three and five per cent of all corks. Now, it is our experience at CGCW that true cork problems are happen perhaps one per cent of the time. But, because true corks were so much of a problem, parts of the wine world turned to the use of other closures some of which actually work and some of which are problematic in their own rights. But credit must be given to the cork industry for not only cleaning up its act but for also bombarding us with the flimsiest nonsense by way of argument for their products.

The latest is the claim that the use of cork closures is surging. Their evidence is this. Sixty of the top one-hundred domestic wine brands are closed with cork. Never mind that the number used to be closer to one hundred out of one hundred. I like cork, but these guys should “put a cork in it”.

ITEM 3: “Alcohol Tax Threatens Cook County Hospitality Industry”
Now, don’t get me wrong. I like Chicago—most of the time. I like Lakeside Drive. I like the Cubs. I like the city’s great restaurants and its world-class museums. But, folks, this nonsense floated by the locals that increasing taxes on alcohol consumption will kill of the whiskey and wine sales is just a little far-fetched.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t like taxes any more than the next guy. And I don’t like “sin taxes” much either. But, the existing taxes have not killed off liquor sales and a small increase in those taxes will not either. In point of fact, most alcohol taxes have not risen much even as the cost of our favorite tipples have. Has anyone ever toted up the cost to us consumers of the all the public relations that are done in the name of wine and whiskey? It isn’t cheap. Mark me down as not worrying that the folks who live in Chicago and the folks who visit there are going to stop drinking just because of small increase in taxes.

ITEM 4: “Wine Riot Comes to DC”
Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not one of those folks camped out just a couple of miles away in downtown Oakland and getting into nightly confrontations with the police. But, with the public and the peacekeepers brawling with each other in places from east to west, I find this headline to be a bit disturbing. “Wine Riot” sounds to close to “occupy Wall Street” and “Raves” for my taste. Besides, I drove out of my suburban enclave to Oakland yesterday for lunch, and as we emerged from the tunnel that connects Alameda island to Oakland, we were hit by the unmistakable leftovers from the previous night’s tear gas. Stinging eyes and nasal passages twelve hours later reinforce my notion that riots are not fun.

ITEM 5: My Antidote
Now, don’t get me wrong. I never drink for solace. Just not in my makeup. But, today, I will take at least a little solace in the fact that my work task this afternoon is taste a bunch of Champagne. Perhaps that is a feel-good message for us all. Never drink for solace, but if you do, try a little bubbly for what ails you.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Sparkling Wine: It’s Not Just For Weddings and Caviar Anymore

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Friends of Connoisseurs’ Guide know that we are big on bubbles and food. Sparkling wine is the lead feature of our November issue each year and we review Champagne every December. We like the bubbly, and we like it at the dinner table.

Tasting that many bubblies means for the last several weeks our counters have been crowded with leftover bottles. There have been so many good ones this round that we have had excuses enough to get to the kitchen and work on recipes both old and new that strike us as being especially sympathetic to sparkling wines. It is part of this job about which you will hear few complaints.

We have long been partial to good Blanc de Noirs and Rosés as terrific mealtime mates, and, as the latter has made a particularly strong showing this year, my enthusiasm for cooking, if you will pardon the pun, has bubbled over.

Starting with a few tried and true beliefs that the bracing acidity of fine sparkling wine makes them perfect partners for dishes with cream sauces and deep-fried fare, I found myself hankering first for a classic French Chicken Fricassee. Now, I am often surprised at just how memory works, but I suddenly recalled an interesting twist on the dish offered up in Cook’s Illustrated magazine some time back. A quick hunt through my stacks of back issues was rewarded with what turned out to be a first-rate recipe in last December’s issue. I readily admit to being an unabashed fan of Cook’s Illustrated and consider it to be a thinking person’s guide to the culinary craft. More often than not, I come away with new insights and ideas when reading its pages, and, in this case, I could not have been more pleased.

A classic Fricassee of poached chicken and cream sauce is a fussy and time consuming dish to be sure, but this unconventional recipe proved to be both quick and wonderfully rich with layered flavors and a silky finishing sauce based on egg-yolk enriched sour cream. We first poured the vigorously fruity Schramsberg Brut Rosé 2008 and thought we had found the perfect match, but the very complex, remarkably refined Chandon Étoile Rosé left us indecisive as to just which one we liked better. Both had the strength to stand up to the flavorful Fricassee, and their keen acid balance was the ideal foil to the recipe’s creamy richness.

After dinner, both bottlings were tightly stoppered and were tried again the next evening with crisply fried, lightly breaded pork cutlets ala Japanese Tonkatsu (minus the traditional sauce). The combination of sweet and savory meatiness and mildly “oily” back notes of this house-favorite dish dovetailed perfectly with the outgoing fruit and cleansing acidities of the two Rosés, and I was once again reminded that from Pakoras to Tempura to Southern Fried Chicken, few libations match up quite so well with deep-fried foods than a bottle of bubbly pink.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Repent and Be Saved, the End is Near... or Not

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“Rains Ruin California Vintage!”, “California's 2011 Vintage Poses Key Dilemmas” “Harvest Report: Challenges Continue for Grapegrowers”, and “Hurray for California's ‘Bad’ 2011 Vintage!” These are just a few of the headlines among many of late that introduce “reports” from the field in this tardy and most problematic vintage. Some of the stories behind those headlines are thoughtful, some are just silly and some turn out to be the same old whines from those with axes that seem to need endless grinding.

I confess to being a little alarmed and surprised, however, with some in the latter camp who are so convinced that California has lost its way that they find their own special rapture in the saving silver lining of a potentially dismal vintage that to them will spell the end of the ripe “California” style. It is deus ex machina! A crappy vintage will save us, we hear. No more problems with high alcohol and overripe flavors! At last, we can be European! Well folks, as Adam Lee of Siduri Wines and others who actually grow grapes and make wine have articulately pointed out, lesser sugars and stunted ripeness do not necessarily ensure the “refinement”, “nuance” and the oh-so-elusive “freshness” so often cited as being the missing ingredients in our supposedly, sadly flawed local product.

The debate and conjectures of just what the vintage might mean are rife with philosophical meaning. All the usual rants are once again given voice, and a few powerful critics are blamed for leading the industry and wine-drinking public astray. The promise of California’s golden age, when wines were so much lower in alcohol, we are reminded, has been betrayed.

I wonder, as I generally do when the next new round of such lamentations and blame commences, just how many wine drinkers are truly looking to be saved. Did wines get riper and richer because of certain popular and powerful critics, or did those critics becomes popular and powerful because they recognized what people actually like? Are the popular critics the cause or the result of a taste for wines born of California sun?

I do not happen to believe that consumers are fools. Yes, there will always be those who seek out trophy wines solely on the basis of high scores and prices, but from designer clothing to automobiles and fountain pens, the “I only buy the best” mentality is endemic. In the end, most folks ultimately buy what they like, and I do take issue with those who claim that the problem is really that consumers do not know what they like, that they need to be educated, enlightened and saved. I do not see any difference in playing to the fear of buying a low-scoring wine or to the insecurity of being made to feel that you are wrong.

I happen to enjoy wines with firm structures and detail, and yet I also take pleasure in a “big red” now and then and believe there are dishes that demand wines of real authority, richness and weight. At the same time, I am no fan of low-acid, high pH, 16.0% alcohol, hotter-than-hell wines that burn as they slowly ooze down the throat. Still, I am not going to tell anyone else that they are an idiot if that is just what they like.

In the end, I am certain there will be both good wines and bad made in 2011. There are in every vintage. It will depend on the variety, the place and the winemaker as well as on the fickle fate of the farmer. That is always the case. There is no question but that great years are responsible for more of the good stuff that the bad, but smugly seeing salvation in the rains and the cold is all a little too much unblinking, true-believer nonsense for me. Equally troubling are ivory-tower conclusions that it is up to the winemaker to “shift their styles away from in-your-face-fruit” as the path to making “dramatic, vintage-specific wines with potentially long lives”. I guess that means then, that if you fail in 2011, it will be your fault. To paraphrase one Mr. Herman Cain, do not blame the weather, blame yourself.

A cool summer and early rains will not turn Sonoma into the Cote d’Or nor Napa Valley into Pauillac. I do not know why we should hope that they would. California is, well, California. A difficult vintage will not make converts of those who appreciate Californian wines, in all of their variety, for what they are. I tip my hat to the winemakers in 2011. I appreciate that a good many have their work cut out for them in 2011, and I wish them the best. The winemaker, however, who says “as for the dumb sh!t who wants a big red, gas up your SUV and pray for global warming” proves that every rule has its exception.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Rich Man, Poor Man, Beggar Man, Thief

Mon, 24 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Every wine drinker I know falls into one of those categories. And all of them, whether rich or poor, enjoy their tipple and probably think they are beating the market with their choices.

That is kind of the way it is with wine. We wind up drinking the wine that meets most of our expectations—and even when we go down in flames from an unexpected disappointment, it is not because we have not tried. That is what value is about. It is about perception. If a bunch of IPO-rich swells care to drink DRC or Screaming Eagle, it is not just that they have more money than taste, they perceive value in those wines.

I perceive something else when I hear those names—too rich for my blood. But you can bet your bottom dollar that I am happy to be drinking my Dehlinger Pinots, my Turnbull Cabernets, my Ravenswood Teldeschi Zinfandels because I find them affordable and exceptional. Few of my neighbors buy wine at the prices that my choices fetch (except, of course, when I am pouring it at our twice a year block parties—Christmas and Fourth of July). But they are wine enthusiasts and if a $20 bottle of Merlot is their usual choice, you can bet that they will only occasionally shell out $35 or $40 for the Hall 2008 Napa Valley rated in our upcoming November issue at two stars/91 points regardless of how much value I may find in that wine.

We keep hearing that the next generation of wine drinkers is different. They are not impressed by labels and prices. Ask yourself if you a label-chaser in your early to mid-20s. Not many of us were. But some of those folks are going to follow in our footsteps. They will successfully interact with the economic system, buy a house in the suburbs, raise two soccer players and move up the wine price continuum.

Every generation thinks it is different. The hippies of the 1970s own wineries today. The folks occupying Wall Street will someday follow in their footsteps. It is what happens. And they will, as we now do, find their own senses of value. The ones who hit the IPO jackpot will become the next generation of swells and will keep Screaming Eagle and Harlan in business. The rest of them will find their wine at other levels, but it won’t matter. They will all find their wine niche just as we did. And they will all feel, as we do, that we are beating the system with our choices.

That is why the conversations about California wine being too expensive are a bit silly. The market makes the decision about whether prices are too high, not a bunch of pundits, prognosticators, sooth sayers or nattering nabobs of negativism.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Why People Buy Expensive Wine

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I know why. I have seen it in action. This is not rocket science. It is nothing more than a mix of high disposable income and a taste for quality. Whether it makes sense to the rest of us is debatable.

There I was at a table of wealthy “swells”, as a well-healed young gentlemen in the latest garments used to be called--and as these gents should also have been so called, and the topic turned to my choice of Pinot Noir. When it turned out that I chose to drink $40-70 Pinots, I was quickly identified by the swells as a piker. Not that they were directly insulting mind you. Just that the name-dropping of their visits to the makers of $100-plus Pinots was meant to inform me that they and I were of different classes socially.

It was not long before I reminded the swells that I could easily afford $100 wines, but that I was one of those people who mostly preferred to drink wines that cost less because they were plenty of highly enjoyable, special wines at lower price points—and moreover, I had the data to prove it. Whether Kosta Browne can hold a candle to the wines of Mark Aubert was not a point I chose to debate. I simply said “yes they can” and the conversation moved on.

In retrospect, however, I do have to give the swells their due. They do drink very good wine. And I got to thinking. How do triple-digit Cabernets compare to Cabs priced in the $50-75 price range? After all, we taste blind, and we don’t gave a hoot for what a wine costs. We only care about how it tastes. And we go through the exercise of tasting all highly recommended wines twice so, win or lose, those expensive Cabs, whether $50 or $150 or $250, are all the same to us.

Using the Connoisseurs’ Guide database of wine reviews, I did two searches—the first for all Cabs $100 and up and the second for Cabs in the $50 to $75 bracket. I was prepared to learn that the expensive wines fared better than the less expensive wines, and I was not disappointed.

In the recent past, CGCW has tasted 111 wines priced $100 and up and recommended all but seven of them. But over half failed to get high commendations—our two- and three-star rankings with point equivalents of 91 and up. If you are of the “glass half full” persuasion, then you will be happy to know that your triple-digit purchases stand a 50-50 chance of being outstanding. If you are of a different persuasion, then you will argue that at least half of all the Cabernets priced at the triple digit level are easily exceeded in quality by dozens of wines at half their price. No argument that the odds go up as the price goes up. The wineries have a pretty good idea about how good their wines are—at least half the time. But, you pretty much have to be a “swell” of one sort or another to focus your wine purchases on bottles at the top of the price scale.

Still, I will admit that I do have a few of those wines in my cellar. Great wine is great wine although I do pick and choose with some care. And I am lucky to have the luxury of a database with tens of thousands of wine reviews to help me choose. The “swells” don’t need CGCW or any other publication to help them decide what to drink. The rest of us choose to be informed.

Here then, just for the record and because they are damn good are top-ten recently reviewed Cabernets priced in the stratosphere.

97 CHAPPELLET Pritchard Hill Napa Valley 2007 $135.00
96 DAVID ARTHUR Elevation 1147 Napa Valley 2006 $135.00
97 JOSEPH PHELPS 97 Backus Napa Valley 2007 $250.00
96 JOSEPH PHELPS Insignia Napa Valley 2007 $225.00
96 MERRYVALE Profile Napa Valley 2008 $165.00
95 PAUL HOBBS Beckstoffer To Kalon Vineyard Oakville 2006 $275.00
96 QUINTESSA Red Wine Rutherford 2007 $145.00
95 RUBICON ESTATE Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2006 $145.00
95 SHAFER Hillside Select Stags Leap District 2006 $215.00
97 STAGLIN Rutherford 2006 $175.00

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
EXTRA! EXTRA! Bargains? You Want Bargains? We’ve Got Them Right Here!

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot and Charles Olken

There is a movement afoot to discredit California wines. Our Cabs are “parodies of themselves”. Our Russian River Pinots are “self-indulgent”. Our inexpensive wines are “made in silos”, not wineries and lack soul, authenticity and value.

We are going to disprove those claims in this and tomorrow’s blog. We start today with the bargains.

Over the last several financially rocky years, most wine lovers, but for a prodigal few, have understandably developed a keen eye for a value. Those who write about wine, of course, have been quick to offer a steady stream of their picks from the lower end of the price spectrum.

Maybe we have missed something when surveying the formidable field of opinion about high-value favorites, but we continue to be surprised and more than a bit puzzled at the short shrift given to California by a good many “experts”. Most recently, a New York Times poll of twenty noted sommeliers, wine directors and retailers who were asked to recommended a wine priced at $12.00 and under netted an absolute zero for California wines. Zero! We simply don’t get it.

Now, we can all agree that the greater percentage of $12 wine made here is not all that special. We are no experts on all the wines of the world, but having traveled for business and pleasure to Australia, Chile, Argentina, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal and places in between, we can tell you that most of the wine everywhere that sells for low prices is not that special.

Yet, not one from California? Well, that strikes us as silly at best.

We taste thousands of California wines every year, and we recall more than a few in that very price bracket that are well ahead of the curve when it comes to fine value. Admittedly, many are wines made by large producers in large quantities, and perhaps that makes them anathema those who are responsible for the wine lists at top-tier eateries, but plentiful supply should not be a disqualifier and, in fact, is a big bonus as we see it. We are not talking complex and collectable wines from the world’s finest vineyards; we are talking about tasty, well-balanced bottlings that deliver genuine bang for the buck. For us, it is simply about what’s in the bottle.

We’ll will make this brief. Feel free to ask questions or to add your own lists of good, priceworthy wines. Spurred by the NYT article, we looked over the list of wines we have tasted in the last year or two and found over 150 wines in the Connoisseurs’ Guide database that rated as GOOD VALUES and had price tags no higher than $12. We list twelve of them below.

There are another 140+, and we are glad to let you see them. Please use the CONTACT button above to send us an email requesting a peak at our database.

BOGLE Merlot California 2008
CARMENET Vintner's Collection Reserve Chardonnay California 2009
CASTLE ROCK Syrah Columbia Valley 2008
CLINE Viognier North Coast 2010
CONCANNON Selected Vineyards Pinot Noir Central Coast 2009
DRY CREEK VINEYARD Fumé Blanc Sonoma County 2010
EASTON House Red California 2008
HAHN Chardonnay Santa Lucia Highlands 2009
HAHN GSM Central Coast 2009
MIRASSOU Riesling California 2010
PARDUCCI Pinot Noir California 2009
PEACHY CANYON Incredible Red Zinfandel Central Coast 2008

As they used to say in Rome: Quod Erat Demonstrandum

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Sometimes It’s About The Wine

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Anybody here remember newspapers? I do. I used to read them all the time. And when wine columns would appear in those darn old rags, most often the writers would write about the wines. Whatever happened to those good old days?

Nowadays, the Internet has become the repository of winewriting, and, for some reason, blog articles are rarely about the wine. I know this to be true because I don’t read newspapers anymore. I just read the blogosphere. And I am getting a little bit frustrated. Most wine articles in the blogosphere are not about “the wine”. Oh sure, they are about wine, but mostly they are about experiences and commentaries on other blogs and reflections on how important the blogosphere is.

You see that is the funny thing about winewriting. There is a lot to say about the wines—if one publishes once a week as I used to do in the Los Angeles Times and the Oakland Tribune. But there is not enough to say about “the wine” if one publishes every day. And besides, column after column about the wine and how wonderful it is would get pretty boring.

Maybe that is the reason why the blogosphere is not about the wine. Or maybe it is because none of the bloggists taste enough wine to write daily about the wine. Maybe they just don’t have enough to say. Maybe some of them have nothing to say about the wine. I will admit that I don’t have a great problem with the good writers. The ones whose insights do move the needle or make me think or bring a new slant to wine. There are plenty of very good blogs about if you don’t mind not reading about the wine.

There are Wine Economists and Wine Worriers and Wine Philosophers and Wine Humorists. There are people who publish pretty pictures and Winewriters For Millenials. There are bloggists who are public relations columnists in disguise and bloggists who do not bother to disguise their public relations efforts. But the one thing there is not is a plethora of articles about the wine.

I know about newspapers because I am old enough to know about them. And I know enough about blogs because I am young enough to write one. And twice in the last week I have had ideas for blog articles that were actually about the wine. Not the kind that my friend, Steve Heimoff, published the other day in which he listed the wines he had tasted, but actually words about the wines.

Both of them will air this week, and, folks, they will be about the wines. It won’t take long to find out whether the blogosphere will tolerate such aberrations in form. Will it turn out that my complaints about the bashing of Heimoff will have drawn more attention or the column on expensive Cabernets with real results or the column on inexpensive wines whose specifics will put the lie to the notion that California cannot produce good, representative, true-to-type wines at an everyday price are more popular.

Stay tuned. You are the judge and jury when it comes to valuing what you read.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
101 Point Napa Cabernet For $14

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Yesterday, Tim Fish of the W. Spectator, headlined his blog with “100 Point Napa Cab--$15”. Of course, no such wine exists. On that premise, I have gone Tim one better.

You see, that is the problem with grade inflation. It has gotten to the point that writers are willing to use the hook of high scores to get you to read their columns. In that, I guess I am at least as culpable as Mr. Fish. In fact, mea culpa and Bacchus forgive me, I am a point and dollar worse. It’s not all bad, of course. One of the folks who responded to his column actually admitted to being a “point whore”.

And with that admission, I am guessing that those who would have us throw the point system out are now laughing up their sleeves at us. Yes, us, folks, because Mr. Fish’s column was read by hundreds and hundreds and maybe thousands and thousands of people—and not one of them objected to being sucked in by the lurid title.

Of course, I would like to say that this blog has never used “titles” to attract readership, but that would be stretching the truth. Titles and headlines are meant to attract attention. And hopefully those of you who are reading this column are not upset with me for sucking you into a column that has zero to do with 100-point Napa Cabs at any price.

But now that you are here, let me pose this question: DOES A 100-POINT WINE EXIST?

I have argued persuasively that it does not. And I have agreed with myself. That is why Connoisseurs’ Guide has never given a score to a wine over 98 points, and only a few of those. For me, at least, I am always hoping that the next wine will be better than anything I have yet tasted. In point of fact, that is often the case. Some of the wines of the 2007 vintage have proven to be better than anything that came before them. At least, that is my impression, and I have no good way of measuring how good my 1973 and 1974 Chalone Pinots may have been by comparison or 1973 Ridge Geyserville or even 1974 Heitz Martha’s Vineyard.

Once a publication starts handing out 100-point wines like they were candy, then 100-points no longer means perfection. There cannot have been hundreds of perfect wines. Maybe a handful. A Tokaji Essencia I once had from a ceramic spoon may have been one. A DRC Romanée-Conti may have been another, but, since neither of those wines was tasted blind against any competition, who knows. The setting and the anticipation may well have made them into some of the best I have ever tasted. My memory certainly thinks so. But, 100 points?

Tim Fish, who is a gentleman and a gentle man, was exaggerating. He said so in the very opening of his blog. But the fact that he attracted so many readers means that he, and I by imitation, are playing on the excesses that do arise in our chosen rating systems. I am sure Bacchus will forgive me, and perhaps Tim will as well. I just could not avoid the opportunity to do him one better—or was it “one worse”?.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Wine Without Food? The Horror of It All

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Lately there has been considerable debate about wine’s proper place. Traditionalists are up in arms that the younger generation actually likes to drink the stuff on its own. The horror of it all.

Is wine something that should be drunk with food, or is it something to be enjoyed on its own? Market studies have shown, much to the amazement of some, that a good deal of our favorite tipple is quaffed down without food, especially among those who occupy the younger end of the wine-drinking demographic.

Now, I suspect that the topic persists as a point of discussion in part because, among Internet-enabled fans of the grape, there are only so many things one can argue about, and, in the blogosphere, horses seem unwilling to die no matter how severely beaten.

As for me, my greatest wine-drinking pleasures have come at the table with fine food and friends, but I cannot say that I have not savored a good glass from time to time without food and see no failing in character on the parts of those who regularly chose such a course. I do, however, take issue with those on either side of the issue who feel the need to aim ridicule and sarcasm at the other.

The latest salvo is aimed at sweet wine drinkers. There is clearly an upward trend in the sales of sweeter wine said to arise from America’s Coca Cola mentality and rationalized as being part and parcel the result of our willingness to drink wine without food. Some affect a political stance in blaming mid-America red-necks and ignorant Bible-Belters and apparently see some kind of insidious threat to the rest of us who generally like our wines dry. Humorless self-righteousness abounds. So too do unceasing smart-ass comments from those who cannot wait to exhibit their own brands of truth. (Have a look at the scores of responses to a recent San Francisco Chronicle story on the new sweet wine wave; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/05/BUKT1LA7LJ.DTL )

Frankly, I am just happy that people are drinking wine, and I have no sense that Americans are “headed the wrong direction”. As far as wine drinking goes, most any direction is the right one if none had existed before. We all have to start somewhere, and tongue-curing, high-tannin Cabernet is not going to convince the absolute novice that the quality of life might be enhanced by drinking wine. If something simple and sweet gets someone thinking, if they would rather see wine as an alternative to Cosmos, Mai Tais and sugary mixed drinks, I am just fine with that.

White Zinfandel was long the object of attack from the pseudo-sophisticate set, but it helped introduce a new generation to wine as something appealing and easy to understand, and Lambrusco did the same. Moscato has lately filled that particular void, and I simply do not see the problem. Does anyone really believe that fads such as these will somehow result in a loss of choice as producers of fine Pinot, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and the like abandon their craft and rush headlong to slake the thirst of the sugar-starved masses? That the rest of us will be left in the lurch?

Give the newbies a break folks, some of them will become devotees of finer wine with time. I remember Riunite, I remember Blue Nun…and I vaguely remember liking them in my long-ago youth. At the end of my sparkling wine lectures at culinary school, I would regularly pour several bubblies ranging from an inexpensive charmat bottling like Cook’s or Andre to top-flight examples from Epernay and Reims. Invariably there would be those in class that preferred the sugary charmat, and just as surely, their more experienced classmates would do their best to make them feel like fools for doing so. I worried that the “offenders” so scorned might be turned off to wine forever. It was always a good time to talk about perspective, and I questioned why you might ridicule someone for drinking that which brings them enjoyment.

To those whose feathers are too easily ruffled, I would offer the following advice. Have a glass, with or without food and as sweet or dry as you like, and please just try to relax.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
The Bashing of Steve Heimoff

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There will be those who accuse me of jumping on a bandwagon after it has left the station, but, dear friends, read closely and you will see that I am actually jumping off the train while it is in full flight.

The other day, Steve Heimoff, he of the eponymously name blog called “Steve Heimoff” made some comments about politics and was roundly bashed for his views. Some folks simply reminded Mr. Heimoff that his expertise lies in wine, not in politics, while others pointed out that they came to his blog to read about wine, not about politics.

I can agree with those folks—and it is why this blog and Connoisseurs’ Guide do not engage, if we can help it, in such discussions. It is not that we lack for political views. If the truth be told, Connoisseurs’ Guide was founded by a couple of refugees from JFK’s New Frontiers and LBJ’S Great Society. If you are too young to have experienced those movements, they were catnip rallying points for liberals back in the 1960s, and we were part of them. You have rarely heard us speak of them or of our views about anything political. With all the sins we were committing on behalf of our favorite tipple, we were getting into enough trouble without also engaging in political debate.

It was hard, at times, to remain silent, but we did even when others in the industry felt that they were free to loose their views on us. Over the more than three decades of our existence, we have heard anti-Semitic, anti-Hispanic, anti-government rants that have set our teeth on edge. As citizens, we have objected, but not as winewriters.

All of which leads us back to Steve Heimoff. Let me make it clear that we are neither siding with Mr. Heimoff’s views nor disputing them—publicly, that is. In fact, the folks who toil here are somewhat divided on the subject between agreeing with those who have labeled the Heimoff views as arrogant and those who have defended them.

Rather, the point here is simply this. Even though we do not engage in political talk in these pages, we do feel moved to defend Mr. Heimoff’s right to say whatever it is he wants to say in his own blog. Political discourse in this country has become mean-spirited, and when Heimoff spouts off, he gets attacked not for his views but for spouting off. If Steve had asked me, I would have said, “Stick to wine, old buddy, it is our last. Political commentary is not”. But he did not ask in the first place, and he has every right to talk about what he finds to be right and wrong in the second.

The funny thing is that he actually was talking about wine, but he made an unfortunate comparison between closed minds in wine and closed minds in politics. And for that he got bashed. I am not fond of some of the language used, but just as I defend Heimoff’s right to call out those folks with whom he disagrees, so too do I defend their right to bash back.

I just hope that I remain able to avoid the subject here as I have enough trouble with folks who take issue with my views about wine.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Seeing ‘Em Like You Call ‘Em: The Pitfalls of Perspective and Wine Writing

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It’s a close play at second. The dust clears and the umpire exclaims…”He’s safe! He’s out! He’s either, neither or both!” A laughable call in a Disney cartoon some seventy years back, but not so funny if you are a newcomer to wines looking for a clear call and reliable guidance from the press.

There are as many opinions as there are bottles, and the participatory populism that is the internet means that everyone in the stands is ready and aching to make the call. Everyone is an expert. No one is an expert—and, as the result, the very notion of expertise is the target of regular assault.

The now-wearisome rallying cry is to be true to yourself and follow your own palate. The problem, of course, that such a viewpoint presumes that you are familiar with every wine, winemaker and wine-region that is out there, and most folks have little inclination to work all that hard. Moreover, most do not have the resources to taste their ways through thousands of bottles to find those that speak to them most. That is where the experience of “experts” and their ability to clearly convey character and perceived quality comes into play. Experts and critics, I would argue, have a useful place, but the role of perspective looms large in their work.

In a follow-up comment on last week’s discussion of Italy’s claimed superiority when it comes to producing food friendly wines, the shadowy Jim Francis pointed out that perspective always shapes opinion. I have no argument here. There is no question that a good many consumers are content with buying by the numbers; 90 points and above is fine, anything less is not. But, those who want more, who actually want to learn and have come to grasp the marvelous range and diversity and outright magic that can come from a good glass need to become active players in the process themselves. Recognizing the perspective of any advice-giver seems a good place to start.

Now, this morning’s musings are not meant as a critique of this or that writer or publication. There has been and will be more time to explore specific instance, but the trigger for thought on the topic was last Sunday’s New York Times piece on “What Do Wine Experts Recommend for Cheap Drinking”. It has already raised a few eyebrows and garnered more than a couple of sidelong looks for its wholesale exclusion of California, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina and Washington State as sources for fine values at $12.00 or less.

I do not know how many “experts” were polled, but the list of twenty cited was an impressive roster of retailers and sommeliers, both male and female, throughout the country. On the surface, the mix is a good one, and there would seem to be little argument with recommendations from people with credentials like these. But, when the question of perspective is raised, then the results become a bit less “scientific”.

Who polled the experts? It was Alice Feiring, the nemesis of Robert Parker and self-proclaimed savior of natural wines who rarely has a kind word to say about California wines. Hmm, might perspective play any role here? No, she did not pick the wines, but she picked the pickers. The question has been raised that just maybe that sommeliers, who by the way made up the majority of respondents, might have their own biases as people who necessarily are looking for something out of the norm, something not easily found, something that will mark their lists as unique. And, while two New World wines managed to make the cut, one was from Oregon and the other from New York, both which were recommended by sommeliers who places of business were understandably located in Oregon and New York respectively.

The point, dear readers, is perspective, and the incumbent need on the part of the informed consumer to ask such questions before blindly falling into line. I do not doubt the sincerity behind the participants in the poll, but neither am I ready to enthusiastically embrace their opinions…i.e., Dr. Loosen Riesling as a great wine with Pizza???

My advice? Find those voices that ring true to you, and listen to a fair number before deciding on who is “right”. Bias is not hard to see. Robert Parker likes “hedonistic” wines, Alice Feiring does not. Fair enough. Consistency is key and methodology, I would argue, is critical in its creation. We happen to believe in blind tasting, while others find it anathema. Finding “terroir” is not hard to find if you know come to the table able to understand what you are tasting. Tasting with winemakers over lavish luncheons on their home turf with labels displayed in advance has always struck us as problematic. Everything tastes pretty good in such venues and opinions so formed are necessarily a bit suspect.

In the end, all of us in the trade, be they retailers, sommeliers or writers, are bound by opinion and cannot escape perspective. The best of them, like the best umpires, to keep the baseball analogy going, understand that it is not about them, it is about the integrity of the game. They work to look at the play from as many angles as possible before making the call. It is the way you get to the major leagues.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Great Wine Goes With Everything

Wed, 05 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I know a guy who says that great wine goes with everything—and to prove it, he will open a great bottle and drink it with everything from soup to nuts.

I am not that guy. But, he, who does follow that unorthodox practice, is a noted chef of a multi-star restaurant, and while I have been the recipient of his great wine and food pairings, he insists that breaking the mold is a good thing.

Tonight, I was confronted with something of a Hobson’s choice. Mrs. Olken had decided that a rainy, windy night in San Francisco called for comfort food and she baked a chicken to simple perfection, made a creamy mash of Yukon Gold potatoes, my new favorite for mash because they whip up so rich and creamy without a lot of added fat, and some fresh peas. I can’t remember the last time we had a meal as simple and simply and completely satisfying and so right for the day.

That’s the easy part. The tougher part came when Mrs. Olken then asked for some wine, and I went to the fridge to pull out the Knights Bridge Chardonnay that has just garnered a big rating (two stars/91 points) in the October issue of CGCW. I had resealed it last week after our second tasting of the wine and put the remnants in the fridge. When I pulled it out tonight, it was a bit oxidized, and I have learned over the years that I may be able to taste through minor flaws in wine and find their good sides but that my better half is less tolerant and expects more from her personal sommelier.

Well, there was no other chilled white in sight, but what I did have was a couple of bottles of very good Cabernet Sauvignon left over from our mid-day tasting. We do tend to pour out most of what we do not consume in tastings and typically give a couple of the better bottles to our neighbors. So, sitting on my counter tonight were Rubicon Red Wine 2008, Beaulieu Georges de Latour Private Reserve 2008 and Monticello Tietjen Cabernet 2008. As you have already guessed, the topic for today was Rutherford Cabernets, and they were delicious. Young, tough, deep and full of the potential for grandeur over time that has made the category so central to the fortunes of California wine.

The Rubicon, I knew, might be a bit on the big side, but it was also very special and how bad could it be to serve great wine with chicken—even when that great wine was too young, too tough, too much in need of cellaring? After all, we were going to drink it with something. And, besides, the Chardonnay had not held up for a week in the fridge, the magnum of Gloria Ferrer Brut that we had enjoyed the previous night had somehow not made its way back to the cool spot it deserved., and the red meat was nowhere to be seen.

I wish I could tell you that the match was a roaring success. It was not. The wine was, as expected, more than the chicken could stand. After a couple of tries at drinking them together, we simply abandoned that notion and consigned the Rubicon to the mashed Yukon Golds. I poured a little of Mrs. Olken’s pan gravy over the mash, a little salt and pepper for gusto and, lo and behold, a foil for the wine had emerged.

The bottom line for me is this. When the right wine, as my sense of pairing does not exist, go for the best alternative around. Maybe it was not perfect. Maybe some folks are reading this and wrinkling up their noses and muttering “there he goes again”. I can take it because no matter what else can be said, we got to drink damn good wine and enjoyed it. I am still not likely to try to partner one wine with everything from soup to nuts, but tonight, with a baked chicken and mash, a great wine was still a great wine.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Why Prohibition Was Good For America

Tue, 04 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Even the Ken Burns documentary now airing, with its PBS—nose in the air attitude, cannot hide the fact that Prohibition was one of the best things ever to happen to this country.

There, I have said it. I wish there were a different spin, a kinder view, but it is a fact undisputed by any responsible observer, that alcohol was too often the opiate of the masses and that the economic and emotional hardships caused by that state of affairs needed addressing.

The funny thing is that other issues in our society also needed addressing and Prohibition worked in very good ways for things like Women’s Suffrage and the rooting out of police corruption. These are good things, as is the way in which the control of alcohol distribution was taken from the hands of the producers and put through the three-tier system. That move alone meant that alcoholic excess was somewhat hindered.

What has surprised me in the Burns series that has one episode left to run—although it is bound to be rerun as have his other documentaries—is that the amount of alcohol consumed during Prohibition went up rather than going down. That might seem like a contradiction in terms and repudiation of my earlier philosophical observations, but, it turns out that the shift in drinking habits from cheap bear in tied house saloons to fancier liquors in speakeasies resulted in a shift in who got drunk. Was it better that the “swells” became the big drinkers and that the Saturday evening beer swillers were at least a little slowed down? Pardon my politically incorrect observation, but I am comfortable with that exchange.

I endorse the argument that society should govern the choices of people as little as is possible, and clearly, the unintended consequence noted above was not at all what the “dries” were trying to accomplish. But, slowing down excess is a good thing. It is good thing today that we have drunk driving laws. We can debate levels and enforcement mechanisms but reducing the carnage done by inebriated drivers is a good thing.

The responsible consumption of alcohol does no harm. Laws which encourage that behavior are okay with me. Prohibition may have been the wrong cure for the problem, and giving states control over the sale of alcohol in ways that have mostly benefited the middlemen in the three-tier system has hardly been an ideal reponse. But both Prohibition and the three-tier system have had their benefits. If Prohibition ultimately proved to be unacceptable because of its wrongness, and if state control of alcohol to the detriment of responsible consumers needs to be changed because of the wrongness that it does, we do need to remember that not all that came down in Prohibition was bad and not everything done in the name of Repeal was good.

I am not trying to be a contrarian with these comments so much as I am suggesting that Prohibition was a response to a problem. Its arrival did some good for some people, and we need to keep that in mind as we move forward. There are good reasons for bad laws. What we need to do is to make better laws if we are going to make laws. And that dictum applies to alcohol in the same way it applies to everything else.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Money Talks: the New Battle for American Hearts and Minds

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

In the land of the Coca Cola drinkers, sugar is king—or so some wine pundits would have you believe.

Last week, I had a bit of fun with the claim by Lettie Teague of the Wall Street Journal that Italian wines are the best to be had when it comes to matching food with wine by dint of their acidity, commonplace bitterness and the fact that Italians apparently drink with food more frequently than anyone else. I get the point, and my reaction to that little trifle was one of amusement.

I am less amused, however, by the trite and tiresome look down the nose at the American palate as being one so governed by a love of sugar, and thus being incapable of appreciating or creating wines that find a comfortable place at the table.

Still, come the next day, I was grinning over my morning coffee about such silly perceptions and those who would offer them up as the premise of some invalid and useless conclusion when I read a thought-provoking piece of reporting on Jeff Lefevere's Good Grape website. Suddenly, I started to wonder about this and other perhaps-not-so-random championing of the virtues of Italian wines.

It seems that European Union (EU) wine producers –- Italy being the leading exporter of the bunch -- has launched an aggressive, very well-funded marketing and advertising campaign, and the American wine drinker is very much in the crosshairs. Jeff’s piece on the subject is a good one and will set any fan of the grape to thinking.

Now it may be simple co-incidence that Italian wines are recently grabbing a fair share of the media spotlight—check out the October 31 issue of The Wine Spectator, for example—and Jeff is making me wonder. The wine-reporting game is a cyclical one, and every subject returns in time, but I confess that we who write about the stuff are always on the look for a good story, something with a little more shine and shimmer.

A new, well-polished packaging of classic, “terroir-driven” (yawn), history-drenched-but-still-innovative wines from Europe cannot but get attention. That is, after all, what good marketing is all about. Maybe this is just the beginning, and, since no one save the Chinese can afford finer French wines, get ready for the EU song-and-dance set and their tales of Italy, Iberia, Germany, Greece and the sadly neglected regions of France.

The funny thing, however, is that if Ms. Teague and her many fellow travelers are right in their condescending opinions of Americans as mostly sugar-dulled dimwits that would not know vinous sophistication if it bit them in their butts, then is the EU wasting its now diminished money. Maybe European vintners should cynically embrace global warming for their own economic good and start producing an ocean of the lumbering, low-acid, over-oaked plonk that plays to the look-down-our-noses interpretation of American taste. But, perhaps, just perhaps, they really do believe that “the colonies” are not a lost cause after and, that with a little education and training, we can yet discover what wine is really all about.

I expect that among those in the wine business, there will be many with axes to grind and debts to pay as the new global wine market finds definition. And there will be honest voices and those who at least believe they are honest and tell us so even as they go off on fancy junkets and write tasting notes on the wines they taste “over there”. Of course, there will also be those who know how to make a buck—we know them for their “pay for a label and we will run your wine review” approach. In short, it will be business as usual. I just hope that the polarity of latter-day politics, the “us vs. them” mindset that thrives on damning the other side can be kept at bay. When was it that real wine appreciation required choosing up sides?

http://goodgrape.com/index.php/articles/comments/the_old_world_eu_wine_reform_and_battleground_usa/

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
The Great Vineyard Designate Debate. To Blend or Not To Blend—That Is The Question

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Let’s face it. Everyone has a nose and everyone has an opinion, and even those whose noses are suspect still have opinions. Take the case of vineyard-designated wines. There are wine writers in this world who pan the notion of vineyard-designated wines, specifically Pinot Noir from the Russian River Valley and the Sonoma Coast, and yet praise those very wines as the second coming of the grape.

Now, only a wine geek, a cartographer or a person with more money and time than brains would argue that we need not only more vineyard-designates, but also vineyard-designates separated into blocks, sub-divided by clonal selections and then made in reserve and regular bottlings. Yet that is what we are getting these days in some iteration or other, and, for every winery that makes two or three bottlings, there seems to be another that makes six or eight or ten.

This debate, not a new one here in California, has taken on a different slant lately simply because there are so many wines with limited production. Not many typical Pinot aficionados can taste them all, so, when the releases from Williams Selyem or Kosta Brown or Arista hit the street, the buyers of those wines are either guessing which they will like by reading the winery releases or turning to those whose job it is to taste them all—like Connoisseurs’ Guide, for instance.

I don’t really mind that some critics wish for fewer wines to taste. I don’t really mind that some even say that blends of many vineyards would yield better wines. Those folks have noses and opinions and they are entitled to both. I just wish they were not sometimes so short-sighted and forgetful of the past.

It was not so long ago here in California that the majority of coastally grown, varietally labeled wines were multi-vintage blends. Not all mind you, but most. The argument put forth by the blenders, all of whom now make vintage-dated wines, were that blends allowed them to offer a consistent product from year to year, decade to decade. Sort of like hand soap.

As wine became more than a cheap tipple for Americans, the demand for better wine also led to a demand for vintage-dating. And the adoption of vintage-dating forced wineries to make better wine and to sort out their stock into levels of quality. It is no accident that vintage-dated wines are of higher quality than were their non-vintaged blends some decades back. It was not just the overall upgrade of vineyards and techniques. It was the need to make better wines with special personalities that drove much of the switch into vintage-dating. Blends were, well, blends, with all of the “averaging” of quality that such blends inherently delivered. Vintages vary, although it has turned out that vintages are not destroyers of quality but determiners of style. And with winemakers forced to deal with vintage variation, they are also forced to pay attention to every aspect of their business.

Vineyard-designations are a lot like vintage-dating. They force the wineries to pay attention on a very small and specific scale. No more picking everything when it is more or less ready. Now vineyards are picked according to rigorous study of the grapes therein, and often more than once in order to get the right blocks picked at the right time. Wineries handle those separate lots as individual wines in the winery. No more averaging. Now, there are lots of wine to look after and each lot is different. That does not say that each lot needs to be bottled separately. The Kosta Browne bounty of vineyard-designates runs to several thousand cases. But, the winery’s AVA-labeled blends run near to ten thousand cases total, and those blends are quite good wines with ratings running close to the stratosphere. They are just not, in this case, as interesting as almost all of their vineyard-designates, some of which actually do earn stratospheric ratings.

You can count me as among those who want to see vineyard-designations for wines of significance. In the world of fine wine, it is the small differences that add up to the big differences in the amount of enjoyment we derive.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Acidity and Bitterness Are The Keys To Wine Service With Food—So Says Lettie Teague

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The vote is in. Italian wines are the best “food wines” in the world... at least according to Lettie Teague of the Wall Street Journal. Wines from France and America, from Germany and Spain, from Portugal and Argentina need not apply.

According to Teague, Italians drink wine with food often, “perhaps more often than anyone else”. Apparently, practice makes perfect, and since Italians are, according to Teague, the most practiced folks at drinking wine with food, their wines must therefore be best. I suspect that Italy’s neighbors to the North and West just might argue with both the conclusion and premise.

Italians wines’ mealtime brilliance is attributed to the “fact” that they have the twin virtues of high acidity and bitterness, both of which are deemed to be the keys to success of any successful food and wine match. “Italians love acidity the way Americans love sugar or the way the French love a wine that only they can pronounce”, and “the Italians love bitterness seemingly as much as they do acidity.”

Ah, there she goes again. The old clichés are summoned like calling cards, and they get tossed around with a vehemence that assumes we have learned nothing in the food revolution of the last forty or fifty years. If you ask Teague, the French are stubbornly superior in their thinking, and America is populated by Coca Cola-dulled palates that are either beyond redemption or still waiting to see the light. Oak is bad and acid is good. I have wearied of such stale and stereotypical pronouncements, and every time they are rolled out in support of some new thesis, I cannot resist sarcasm…and the article in question invites it with malice.

Think about the comparisons. Nebbiolo better than Côte Rotie. Aglianico better than Paulliac. Nero D’Avola better than Burgundy. Chianti better than Loire Reds—okay, may she wins a point there.

But understand what Ms. Teague is trying to say. Whether or not we agree is beside the point, and even if as I would like to think, her rather sweeping and simplistic brushstrokes were attempts at humor as much as anything else, they are, at their heart, demeaning and dismissive of anything and anyone other than her darling of the day...in this case, Italy.

It strikes me as a bit ironic that while the new electronic world has fostered unbridled democracy and sanctification of individual opinion -- whatever you like is right, there are no right and wrong answers, you are the best critic – here is a piece of “professional” wine writing has gone the other way and incites a certain superior wine-geek political correctness. It is not enough to inform, describe, recommend and get downright excited about a wine or wines. In this case, there seems to be an abiding need to hurl stones and some degree of damnation at everything else. Italians wines are in part “better” because they are not California or French, and, in so saying, it follows that since Italian wines succeed by dint of their vibrant acidity, French and American wines are therefore listless and dull. What is listless and dull, however, is this kind of specious logic.

My dear Mrs. Teague, I appreciate that you are trying to tell me what you like at the dinner table. Indeed, I encourage and applaud such an approach. Challenge my thinking. Make a case for your beliefs. But, do not waste my time telling me about the inherent failings of everything else. Wine appreciation does not work that way.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904194604576581160159601564.html

Tuesday Tributes
How To Drink Cult Wines For Less

Tue, 27 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There I was, sitting at a swank dinner party/fund raiser for which I had contributed a dozen older wines, and the fella next to me confided that he only drinks Aubert and Morlet Pinot Noirs. But, he was happy to try my Farrell and Dehlinger wines at one-half to one-third what he was paying for his Pinots.

Now, I have nothing against wines that cost an arm and a leg as long as they taste good. While price is always an object, if one can and is happy paying triple-digit prices for wine, that is none of my business. My dining companion then dropped the other shoe. “What do you pay for wine”, he asked, and I, having already been made to feel a bit like a piker by Mr. Triple Digit (a nice guy, so nothing personal intended) had to confess that I rarely pay triple digits for any wine.

That answer held him off for a while as we worked through what my business here at Connoisseurs’ Guide is all about. After all, I taste hundreds of wines every month, and, if I cannot find a great Pinot for $40-60, then I am not doing my job very well. It is those priceworthy wines of grandeur that fill my cellar. And about the only points I really scored with Mr. Triple Digit was that my cellar of several thousand bottles going back to the 1970s for multiple bottles from my early collecting days was more extensive and older than his.

But, he was not to be deterred and then spoke up about drinking DRC at the fabulous Gary Danko restaurant in San Francisco (number one in the just released 2012 Zagat Guide). One can eat at Danko for under $100 sans wine and get a fabulous meal. I still prefer The French Laundry, but at $250 sans wine, an overnight in the Napa Valley and an impossible to crack reservation system, I eat at Danko about once a year and The French Laundry about one every ten years.

That is how it is with cult wines for me. And I have never purchased a bottle of DRC or Chateau Petrus. The last first growth in my cellar was Ch. Margaux purchased as futures from the 1981 vintage at $27 per bottle. By the 1982 vintage, wines like that shot up well beyond my price threshold.

After dinner, on the way home, I commented to my wife, “Well, that is how the other half lives”, and she being wiser than me provided the real answer—“that is how the other one-tenth of one per cent lives”.

Now, this is no “class warfare” epistle. I live pretty far up the food chain myself, and my $50 and $100 dollars wines are not exactly what the every day guy has lying around. To be sure, I am more likely to drink $20-$25 wine on a regular basis, but I do accept that my limits are part of my economic reality and that Mr. Triple Digit, now on his third high-tech startup, bases his purchases on his economic reality.

So, the question remains. How does one drink cult wines for less? Maybe I should have phrased the question somewhat differently because the answer, in truth, is that one does not drink DRCs or Mark Auberts or Screaming Eagle for “less”.

What one does, and I have given the answer away above, is that one looks for great wines at less than cult wine prices. The new Kosta Browne Pinots are out. Some are already spoken for, but some can still be had at prices closer to my reality. In fact, I will look for the Kosta Browne Sonoma Coast Pinot, to name one example, in restaurants because it will be great wine at a high but affordable price.

There are only a couple of ways to find wines like the Kosta Browne. Those are reading what folks like me write and tasting a lot of wine. I recommend both. Read Connoisseurs’ Guide—by all means. But read The Spectator, The Enthusiast, Parker, Tanzer, The California Grapevine. If you subscribed to them all, it would cost a couple of hundred dollars a year, and you would get ideas worth far more than that.

There are plenty of wines that cost less than cult wines but which offer great depth, complexity and, yes, relative value at $40 to $100. And there are real bargains, if rarely the absolute best wines, for $15 to $30. But with so many wines and so little time, it does pay to read and to allow trusted sources to help narrow down the choices. It is not about points entirely. It is as much about descriptions. But, in the end, the way to drink really well for less is to pay attention. I am lucky. I have to pay attention. It is what I do for a living—and thank you to all who allow me do it. Paying attention to trusted sources and then using both what you read and knowledge of your own palate are going to allow you to choose between the richness of Kosta Browne and Dehlinger and the tighter styles of Gary Farrell, Peay and Alysian.

You may not be able to drink cult wines for less, but you can certainly drink grand, ethereal, palate-exciting wines for far less than cult wine prices.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
In Praise of Pinot Noir Of A Certain Age

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I brought the old Pinot Noir to a dinner party last week. Those who wanted aged wine with the underlying sturdiness of Cabernet were disappointed, but those good folks who appreciated Pinot’s lighter, more nuanced side were delighted.

The wines in question were Dehlinger Goldridge Vineyard 1999 and Gary Farrell Russian River Valley 1999. Neither carried the unrepentant muscularity that made the Pride Mountain Vineyard Cabernets tasted earlier in the week into such superstars. These were quieter wines with a kind of soft-spoken inner confidence. We drank them with a Wild Mushroom Risotto and a grilled fillet of Arctic Char. The Dehlinger, being the richer of the two, was the preferred wine of the Cabernet drinkers. “Something to sink your teeth into” was how one of its fans described it despite the fact that the Pride wines would have made the Dehlinger look like a 97-pound weakling by comparison.

The Gary Farrell, as the older wines from that winery continue to show, came with a different kind of tightness than that found in Cabernet. Those wines always impress, as did the 1999 on Friday night, with their bright, well-integrated acidity. Both it and the Dehlinger were far better suited to the menu than a sturdier, still tannic red like the Pride Reserve Cabernet of the same age would have been.

There are those who say that Pinot Noir is never better than on the day it is crushed. That may be true for those who love the youthfully direct vitality of children. Being of a certain age myself, I like a bit of sophistication in my tipple, and while it has long been accepted that we can all get that precious commodity from the local Cabernets, it has been less evident with Pinot Noir because the grape only found its way to grandeur here in any kind of wholesale way in the last two decades or so. Maybe Pinot, even great Pinot, will not last three decades and more the way the Pride Cabs are going to do, but when very good Pinot reaches its second decade, it is not yet ready to fall apart. It has just begun to show what it is really made of.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Who Says Ripe Cabernet Does Not Age

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Back in the 1970s, when California Cabernet outpointed Bordeaux reds in blind tastings, folks said those wines would not age. For reasons that elude me, they are saying the same thing today.

The proof, of course, is in the pudding. And it seems that we need to revisit the pudding each and every decade in order to have the naysayers taste the new pudding. Of late, I had begun to wonder if the naysayers might actually have a point. After all, the Cabernets from the mid-90s until now have been much riper and more obvious early in the lives than those lovely Cabs of the early 1970s.

We all remember those wines, don’t we? The concentrated bottlings of 1970 that benefited from early frost that reduced the crop and somehow produced small berries with lots of character have, from the day they were issued, been winning tasting against comparable wines from Bordeaux. The wines prevailed in the 1970s and in the 2000s. Those more recent results proved the naysayers wrong about their predictions from three decades earlier. And what about those 1973s and 1974s? Has anyone tasted Heitz 1974 Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet lately? We have. It is anything but dead. We recently saw it on the wine list of a famous San Francisco restaurant at $2500 a bottle. So, to show off a bit, we brought our own bottle from our cellars where it has rested from the day we captured it at the Heitz tasting room in Rutherford. The sommelier was so impressed that he gifted us a taste of 1982 Chateau Margaux as thank you for the taste we poured for him.

But, we are in a different era now with wines that march to a different drummer. Many of them are highly concentrated, and most of the great wines of the past fifteen vintages have not stinted on ripeness. Even wines that we point to as proof that all Napa Cabs are not lacking in pseudo-European grace (which can be translated into “not over 14% alcohol), like Corison, are still riper in actual count than most of the leading Cabs of the 1970s.

Not long ago, an experienced writer commented that Napa Cabs have become “a parody of themselves”. We strenuously disagreed, and now the proofs are beginning to come in. The puddings from the 1990s are beginning to emerge in vertical tastings that will show whether Napa lost its way or the naysayers have once again stepped on their own palates.

As Steve Eliot mentioned in yesterday’s blog, he and I journeyed up to Pride Mountain Vineyards at the very top of Spring Mountain to taste a vertical flight of the winery’s Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon stretching back to 1994. Our basic math skills tell us that the oldest of those wines, those from the 1990s, ranged in age from twelve to seventeen. If they were going to go south in a hurry, they would have given themselves away by now. But, even with alcohols ranging into the high 14s and low 15s, there was not a dead wine in the bunch. We will have a full set of tasting notes in an upcoming issue of Connoisseurs’ Guide, but suffice it to say that even the ’96 and the ’98, wines from less than fine vintages, were drinking quite well.

Pride is, to be sure, a hillside winery with growing conditions that are different from those found on the Napa Valley floor. They typically pick into November and have been known to pick into December in the occasional year. The vines have often stopped their photosynthesizing, and the grapes have then matured through a combination of leftover energy and a bit of dehydration—and we know that conditions like that are not what the texts tell are desirable for fine wine production. Yet, the Pride wines have been stunning more often than not, and neither high ripeness nor high alcohol has harmed their aging curves one little bit. Primary fruit is being replaced by secondary and tertiary elements that show increased layering and increased textural suppleness. Every one of the wines from the 1990s is going to live twenty years. The best of the group will not only live longer than that but will also carry their grandeur with them. If this tasting is to be believed, and we think it should be, then many of the ripe California Cabs of the 1990s are going to live longer than many of the people who own them. They were delicious in their youth, and they are delicious as they grow into middle age, and they will be delicious when they are grandparents to a new set of young Cabernets years from now.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
How A Pizza And A Fig Changed My Life

Wed, 21 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I came into wine-loving by way of food—back in my high school days if the truth be known. And, even today, it is the discovery of great wine and food combinations that stokes my passion.

Late Summer and Fall is the second and primary fig season, and, in local farmer’s markets and specialty produce purveyors, there is a wealth of various varieties to be had of late. From sweet and juicy Black Missions, to mild, meaty Black Turkeys and large, pink-fleshed Calmyrnas, the time is nigh to enjoy the year’s best. Which wine with figs? It all depends on just how you prepare them, and some remarkably delicious combinations await those who are willing to venture outside of the usual dessert realm.

While a plateful of fresh, well-ripened figs can make a satisfying meal-ending treat with a glass of Tawny Port, I confess a real weakness for more savory preparations, particularly those that employ figs in various pizza recipes. In fact, I have yet to meet the fig pizza that I do not like. Typically, figs will be paired up with any number of cheeses running from tangy chevres, to blue-veined varieties and buttery, soft-ripened versions such as Italy’s Crescenza. At times, salty meats such as prosciutto or bacon will find their ways into the mix, while caramelized onions are often used to impart a boost in sweetness. I am especially fond of those that come with a bit of arugula whose refreshingly bitter bite provides just the right counterpoint to the dishes’ richness.

The inspiration for today’s musings was just such a rendition served after a remarkable vertical tasting hosted by Pride Winery. Sixteen vintages of Pride’s Reserve Cabernets were opened for a small group of wine journalists to celebrate the winery’s twentieth anniversary. We will be reporting at length on the wines in the near future, but it was the post-tasting pizza that set me to thinking, and it gets the spotlight today. The fig, cheese and arugula pizza was merely one of many outstanding dishes offered up during lunch, but it was the perfect morsel at just the right time and immediately brought my tannin-numbed taste buds back to life.

Now, after several hours of tasting, discussion and spitting, it was clear that a glass for drinking was required, but a powerhouse red was not the thing. Normally, I would opt for a soft, fruity, low-tannin red, but, with none to be found on the table, I reached for a glass of Pride’s 2009 Vintner Select Chardonnay. I could not have been any happier. Maybe it was fatigue, maybe it was the gnawing hunger that comes from lengthy tasting, maybe it was the gorgeous setting and the good company, but that Chardonnay hit the mark in ways I was not expecting. Big, lavishly fruited Chardonnay is now on my short list of fig-pizza favorites.

Those familiar with Pride Chardonnays know them to be rich and generous wines that make no apologies for ripeness, but they are driven first and foremost by fruit. In the June issue of CGCW, we awarded the 2009 Pride Vintners Select two stars and 91 points with the following notes…

“We cannot argue that this extravagant wine is not a bit over the top, but along with its high ripeness and lavish oak it does offer lots of juicy, apple-like fruit. It is an immense mouthful with an oily feel and plenty of unbuffered heat at the finish, and, while it will be anathema to some, fans of truly powerhouse whites will revel in its unfettered richness.”

No, it is not a wine we would pour with more delicate dishes, but on this day it found brilliant affinity with the sweet and savory aspects of the perfect cheese/fig/arugula pizza, and it gave me a memorable, wine-and-food match that will be repeated again when flamboyant, fully-ripe Chardonnay is on the menu.

Tuesday Tributes
The New Prohibitionists

Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I drink to their health. They are saving the world from the 100-point system, from binge drinking, from wines without terroir, from screw caps or corks—depending on who has the floor at any given time.

Yes, there are lots of prohibitions in our business, and they do not all involve overconsumption. But one does, and that is the attempt by the anti-alcohol forces to redefine binge drinking. So, let’s start with Webster. “Binge”, according to Webster and his buddy Merriam is drunken revelry. Now, I don’t know about you, but I have no problem with revelry. Revelry is just fine with me. When it comes to revelry, I am an addict. I have been known to laugh right out loud. “Drunken”, of course is a “horse of a different feather”—as we used to say back in the old neighborhood. Loss of control is not so nice, and certainly “a drunken binge” or a “bender”, as it used to be called, is not anything to be celebrated.

So, when the anti-alcohol folks redefine “binge drinking” as exceeding a blood alcohol of 0.08%, they are trying to rewrite Webster and Merriam. No longer is a binge equated with drunkenness and benders. Now, these folks are trying to tell us that anyone who has a blood alcohol of 0.08% not only should not drive a car but is also guilty of the shameful act of “binge drinking”. We are not talking about wobbly walking or slurred words or even talking too loud. We are talking about two glasses or three glasses of wine. In other words, folks, virtually everyone who is reading this column is a binge drinker according to these Prohibitionists.

It is easy enough to ignore them. They have a problem with moderation. To them, there is no level of alcohol consumption that is acceptable. Sort of reminds me of the folks who would ban the 100-point system.

Now, I don’t blame you if you are now scratching your head and wondering how I could possibly get from A to B with this line of reasoning. Thanks for asking. I am going to tell you.

The folks who would ban alcohol object to what it does to some people—mainly those who overindulge and wind up doing things they ought not do—like pickling their insides and destroying their lives. In the name of stopping that human carnage, for that is what it is, the Prohibitionists would ban all alcohol. They do not understand that it is the drunks, not the alcohol, that is the problem. That equation was so obvious during the real Prohibition that, for the first and only time in our country’s history, we actually reversed a Constitutional amendment. No need to relive that story except to note that it was fear of the abusers that brought us to that unholy place and it was those who realized that use does not equate to abuse who finally brought us back.

Those who would ban the 100-point system make a similar argument. It is all about abuse. We must ban the 100-point system because some folks misuse it. Never mind that the movement is being fronted by a winery that used to proudly proclaim its high ratings until it stopped getting them. If people have accidents in cars, we need to ban cars. If planes fall from the sky, we need to ban planes. If wineries get ratings they don’t like, we need to ban the rating system. It is never about the truth with these folks. It is always about their own narrow agendas. Ban alcohol because some people abuse it. Ban the 100-point system because we don’t like the way it gets used.

The point-banners call themselves the Score Revolutionists, and they will undoubtedly be delighted that someone is talking about them. I am okay with that. I want to make sure that we all know what is at stake here. It is not the end of abuse. It is the end of wine ratings. The millions of people who read wine publications or who post on or read the score agglomeration sites like Cellar Tracker and Snooth are guilty of binge drinking by another name if you ask the 100-point haters. They are as surely prohibitionists as those who would ban alcohol. They know better than you. And they see trouble just as surely as those folks back in River City did.

The next time they raise the cry or proclaim that they are inventing an “app” or some other nonsense like that, we need to treat them like the Prohibitionists they are. We need to laugh out loud. Some would call that revelry. Not to worry. It’s okay with me.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Late Again—The Harvest Has Begun And So Has The Worrying

Mon, 19 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The harvest in California has begun, and it looks like another disaster. No, wait! It is going to be a great vintage; a small one, but an outstanding one. Take your pick.

Late is late, and disaster always looms just around the corner when the harvest is late. The world may be slowly heating up, but you would be hard pressed to prove it along the Northern California Coast, and we are looking at a comparatively cool season for the third year in a row—and really for the fourth year in the last five.

The annual guessing game about just how good or how bad the new crop will be has begun, and giddy excitement or depression is all a matter of whom you ask…again. So, what is the truth? It’s simply far too early to tell, and, to be honest, I have never much been interested in the practice of vintage predictions before crush is finished and grape juice has, in fact, become wine. I do not see the point other than to pass the time and sound important and insightful. Its like week-long predictions about which team will do what on Sunday’s gridiron and endless political crystal-ball gazing as to who will occupy this or that office some 16 months down the line. I guess it’s a way to pass time…there are no rewards for guessing right and most everyone winds up guessing wrong. It’s the same story, I think, in the vineyard.

What is “good” may well differ by dint of perspective. A very light crop, even if high quality, may not make winemakers deliriously happy, but we all know that lesser crop loads can mean more concentration and better stuff in the bottle…except when they don’t. We can talk about where we are now and how this particular late-September stacks up to others in the past, but there is still time to go folks, a goodly deal of it. Will rains stay away? Will nature hit the fast-forward button with significant Indian Summer warming and continue our current warm spell, or will things return to “slow” and thus make ripeness elusive? There are plenty of things that can go right or wrong in the weeks ahead, and, depending on your perspective, what is “right” and “wrong” can be open to debate. If things stay cool, the low-alcohol crusaders will have lots to like, but those whose revel in richness rather than acid-driven wines will not be as happy, and a sudden heat spike or five days of rains could change the playing field dramatically.

The current forecast is a good one—five days of unusual warmth but not excessive heat, and typical cool, autumnal evenings. The grapes will ripen and the acids will stay high. But only if the weatherman does not fool us again.

It is a truism that the ultimate quality factor in winemaking is the fruit that one starts with, but one small hill or valley that separates one vineyard from another can have profound differences, and competing viticultural ideas about just how things should be done can be of real consequence. And, while many dismiss the role of the winemaker as one of simple, hands-off custodianship, I happen to think that skilled winemaking is every bit as important as general vintage conditions. There are winemakers who have a touch, a practiced skill, an art as sure as any great chef…and conversely, there are those who seem to me to have been dropped on their heads as small children. It all makes valid broad vintage pronouncements more difficult yet. “Where” and “who” cannot be overlooked. It is why we taste finished wines, not those in barrel or still in fermentation. And, we most certainly do not taste “vintages”.

I confess to being a bit of a fatalist as vintages go, but not one bound by pessimism. What will be will be, and therein lies the fascination and beauty of reviewing wines for a living. It is what keeps me interested for these so many years. It is renewal. Every vintage is different. There will be great wines in the worst years and failures from the best. There are thousands of new wines available each year, and each has something to say. I will listen. Some will sing with poignant beauty, some will sweep me away and some will no doubt remind of fingernails slowly sliding across chalkboards. Some years will bring more pleasure than others, to be sure, but I will wait until the wines are made before jumping to judgment.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Magnum Bottlings of Sparkling Wine Make Me Thirsty

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I have heard all the explanations, and I don’t care if they are right or wrong. I like good sparkling wine that has been aged en tirage in magnums.

It is that time of the year, as it has been for the last thirty-five or so here at CGCW, that we start popping corks for our annual sparkling wine review. In all truth, I must confess that I have been slow to warm up to fizzy wines, and I do think that many are either too candied or too brittle and bitingly acidic. I must also admit that ever so slowly I have, with the unbridled passion of a true convert, become a fan of the really good stuff.

Now with most wines and spirits, no matter how good they may be, pouring a few extra glasses is neither prudent nor all that rewarding…especially the next day. I am not sure just why, but I find the best sparkling wines to be so engaging that it is all too easy to slip into thinking that, if a little is good, then more must be better. I mean can you really drink too much of the good stuff? I am not talking about the nasty New Years’ concoctions that we all can recall, the mawkish, manufactured potions which could understandably put someone off sparkling wine for years, I mean the good stuff…the really good stuff.

Perhaps it is because fine Champagne and its New World cousins are not wines that I would every chose to drink alone and that there is accordingly more competition for the last glass, but there simply never seems to be enough to quite go around, and the need for a second bottle seems a given. Several months back, I lamented the difficulty that attends finding smaller half-bottle formats for fine table wines, and now I find myself doing the same with regard to 1.5 liter magnum bottlings of fine Methode Champenoise sparklers.

There is much more behind my fond wishes for a better selection of bubbles in big bottles than simple convenience. Experience has taught that, with but an occasional exception, sparkling wines fermented and aged in larger formats are different and almost always better. We have seen it time and again in our tastings going back over the years, and, while we are aware that sometimes that which is bottled in magnum is in fact a different wine owing to everything from cuvee to time en tirage, it is an uncommon evening where a sparkling wine in a 750 ml is not bested by its magnum counterpart.

We have preached from our pulpit and recommended to our readers that they seek out larger bottles, and we are far from being the first and only folks to do so. I really don’t know just why it is that big-bottle bubbly turns out so good. I have heard all of the explanations of ratios of liquid to airspace and the subsequent and very suspect effects of some slow breathing through the cork as the wines age, but I have yet to see the science that can explain what I know to be true. I suppose, in the end, that I am just as happy that I have not. Call me an enological Luddite, if you will, but great wine, and that most certainly includes fine Champagne, is about poetry and passion and the emotional heart far more than about molecular chemistry. I just wish for a bit broader selection of large-format releases, particularly from those local vintners that stand at the head of the class.

We have seen the almost magnitudinal differences in magnums from Mumm, Chandon, Gloria Ferrer and J Wine Company, and I can only guess at what pleasures might lie in store if larger tête-de-cuvée bottlings of J. Schram, the Domaine Carneros Le Rêve and Roederer Estate’s L’Emitage were to be found.

I know what I want for Christmas. Is anyone listening?

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Gerald Asher Asks: What Are Wine Writers Really For

Thu, 15 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I must admit that the title of Mr. Asher’s latest epistle had me more than a little apprehensive, indeed, scared at the prospect of being told that I had somehow wasted almost four decades in the wine writing business.

You see, when Gerald Asher talks, I listen—especially when he talks about the very essence of my professional being. There is no writer I revere more than Mr. Asher. He is keenly analytical. He is honest and incisive in his appraisals. And, he is so much more interesting to read than I am that I just held on for dear life as I searched for his article under the title above.

And once again, Mr. Asher has said what I wish I had said, and he has said it better than I could. It is his view, and mine, of course, that wine writers must be educators. We are helpers along the road to wine enjoyment. I almost wrote “wine appreciation”, but that is too formal. It is not our job to make geeks out of wine enthusiasts, not our jobs to tell them what to think, what to drink, how their palates should or should not react. Educators do not do those things. Dictators do. And there are plenty of dictators in wine writing.

But, the great writers, the ones who might hold the smallest candle to the track that Mr. Asher has laid down are educators. They, we at Connoisseurs’ Guide I hope, speak not only to what we like but to why we like it. Speak not only to today’s pleasures but to the path that we foresee for wines with lovely futures. Speak not only to that future but why we think that future will unfold.

We all drink wine in the here and now, and, for better or for worse, most of that wine is fairly young. Some of it needs not to be aged to any good purpose, but when we pull the cork on a three-year old Kosta Browne or Williams-Selyem Pinot, we hopefully know not only that it is wonderful today but that it will be wonderful tomorrow, and even why it will be wonderful at some point down the road.

Like so many of Mr. Asher’s essays, this one asks questions of us and suggests that we will come to know the answers to wine knowledge when we are able to answer those questions. Connoisseurs’ Guide was founded well over three decades to help answer those questions. We taste lots of young wines, but we also taste lots of older wines.

I like to think that our approach is one that Mr. Asher would endorse. If not, we are not doing our jobs.

And now you know why I was so concerned when I went in search of his comments on wine writers. I found them at the link below. They are worth a read.

http://zesterdaily.com/zester-soapbox-articles/1050-wine-writers-shape-tastes-not-trends

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Great Peachfest—A New Libation Takes Center Stage

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There is nothing new or unusual about cooking with spirits, and, from brandy to whiskey to varied eaux de vie, I have over the years called upon their help in enriching recipes and adding an extra spike of flavor when the need arose. Pan sauces, a classic fondue, the braising matrix for a good Boeuf Bourguignon and untold numbers of marinades come to mind, and I cannot imagine our house-favorite, mashed Thanksgiving yams and pecans without a liberal splash of savory Bourbon in the mix. I have never, however, given a great deal of thought to trying to match up spirits as accompanying drinks with various course of the meal. They are something for sipping before or after…not something to drink neat with the meal.

A recent dinner at Oakland’s outstanding Picán Restaurant, however, set me to thinking in ways that I have not done so before. A couple of weeks back, we attended Picán’s late-Summer Peachfest 2011, and among the evening’s featured offerings was a special ala carte menu. Starting out with a Chilled Peach Buttermilk Soup and progressing from Peach Honey Grazed Fried Quail and White Corn Hoecakes to Barbequed Pork Tenderloin with Corn and Smoked Cheddar Grits and finishing with Peach Fried Pie, Picán had crafted a list of recommended Bourbons to taste with each course. Now, as Bay Area fans of fine Bourbon are well aware, the folks at Picán know what they are doing when it comes to Kentucky’s great spirit, and my you-never-know-until-you-try culinary credo was put to the test.

I won’t claim to having been taken with straight Bourbon matched up to the peach pie, the dish was simply too sweet to let the spirits’ subtleties show through, but I confess to being amazed at how good a few selected samples tasted when paired with the rest of the meal. A sweet, rye-infused glass of Four Roses Small Batch was a remarkably rich foil to the Peach Buttermilk Soup, and its richness played beautifully to both the quail and the pork. A second offering, that of High Plains “Most Wanted” Bourbon Mash from Kansas proved that the Corn Whiskey and Peach affinity was no fluke. These were new and unexpected combinations of flavors that had the wonderful effect of the whole being larger than the sum of its parts. But for the obvious limits imposed by our beverages’ higher proofs, I would have tried a good many more combinations before evening’s end.

There is no way that spirits will ever supplant wine as my meal-time companion of choice, but I was reminded as I so often am in the business I have chosen, that anyone who is open-minded and fascinated by complex flavors is well-advised to think outside of the box. You just never know.

http://www.picanrestaurant.com/

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Tuesday Tributes
Looking For Mr. Goodbargain

Tue, 13 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I love a bargain. In fact, I love a bargain so much that I have been accused of looking for wine love in all the wrong places—like Napa and Sonoma and Santa Barbara. I guess I’m just a glutton for punishment.

Or maybe I don’t have the patience to traipse around from wine store to wine store looking for older Austrialian Rieslings or Semillons—as my good friend Dan Berger has suggested that we all do. Of course, having given this information, Dan then recommends his bargain of the week. Not an older high acid, long-aging wine of the type that his article champions but a “soft, plump” Merlot from Hogue. The irony is too much not to bring forth a giant grin. I don’t question the Hogue; I just love the juxtaposition of a long article whose guidance is totally at odds with the wine recommended.

Nor can I follow the advice of one Robert Parker Jr. whose bargain choices go as high as $25 for everyday quality Zin and Riesling. The wines in question may be decent, like the Trefethen Dry Riesling that he rates at 87 points and we rate at 89. Either way, a quite good wine. But a bargain, or similarly priced Sauvignon Blancs?

Folks, you can do a lot better than that. And here are a bunch of wines, taken directly from our blind tastings and recommended in Connoisseurs’ Guide, that prove the point:

93 CHATEAU STE. MICHELLE Eroica Riesling Columbia Valley 2009 $20.00 GOOD VALUE
Although the aromas of this vibrant young wine take a bit of time and coaxing to come around, they and the similarly lively and nuanced flavors that follow speak directly to very fresh, wonderfully pure Riesling fruit. We typically find Eroica bottlings to be restrained and a bit backward when still in their first years, and that is the case here. That said, the wine's delicacy should not be seen as a failing, and, if it is an attractive, slightly sweet foil to lighter curries and sundry Southeast Asian foods in the short term, it is impeccably balanced and has years of increasing beauty before it reaches its peak.
Reviewed: September 2011

87 KENDALL-JACKSON Vintner's Reserve Riesling Monterey 2009 $12.00 GOOD VALUE
Nicely framed aromas redolent of ripe peach, hints of flowers and jasmine may take their time to open up but open they do and become quite pleasant in the process. The wine is slightly sweet on the palate and gains a bit of roundness as the result but it is also very well-balanced at every stop. It will be a happy mate to pan-fried fish and chicken dishes.
Reviewed: September 2011

87 CLOS LA CHANCE Estate Zinfandel Central Coast 2009 $18.00 GOOD VALUE
Fresh, young, berry-like fruit fragrances are backed up by the clean, like-minded flavors of this balanced, middleweight effort, and, if never an extravagant wine, it is focused and constant and built for the table. It will not fade away anytime soon, but it is sure to make an enjoyable mate now to Summery barbecue standards running from grilled sausages to spareribs slathered in sauce.
Reviewed: September 2011

87 DRY CREEK VINEYARD Fumé Blanc Sonoma County 2010 $12.00 GOOD VALUE
Sauvignon Blanc grassiness gets top billing here even as a bit of citrusy, mineral-tinged fruit manages to make itself known and complete the varietal picture, and, while the wine is not especially deep or layered, it is fresh, firm and well-balanced. It finishes with the kind of brisk, palate-cleansing acidity that makes good Sauvignon so food friendly, and its very modest price invites drinking on a regular basis.
Reviewed: September 2011

88 CONN CREEK Herrick Red Napa Valley 2008 $18.00 GOOD VALUE
Conn Creek's inexpensive Cabernet-based blend is something of a revelation at the price. It is rich, well-fruited and carefully balanced with a real sense of reserve and polish typically found in far more costly wines. Its layered delivery of juicy dark fruits and sweet oak is bound to tempt early drinking, yet do not be fooled by its price tag into thinking that it is a simple gulper to be drunk down right away. It is much more than that, and it will continue to grow for a number of years.
Reviewed: August 2011

87 SANTA BARBARA WINERY Chardonnay Santa Barbara County 2009 $15.00 GOOD VALUE
Clean, crisp and suggestive of green apples with a touch of butter for richness in its aromas, this wine does a fine job on the palate with its ripeness nicely tempered by burgeoning acidity and its citrus-tinged flavors that last well into its bright finish.
Reviewed: August 2011

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Friday Fishwrap
Proof That Man Cannot Drink Wine Alone

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I take a fair amount of flack from family and friends for the hyperbole with which I talk about new wines and spirits that capture my fancy, and I confess they do have a point. Searching out the new and the different is what I do, and the hunt for fascinating new tipples is as much fun now as it was when it began more years back than I’d like to admit. Complacency need not come with experience, and, when something comes along that really excites, my enthusiasm is a bit hard to contain.

With that quick caveat and recognition in mind, I can honestly say that the fourth edition in Heaven Hill’s Parker’s Heritage Collection is as fine a Bourbon as has come my way…period. Each year since 2008, the Heaven Hill distillery in Bardstown, Kentucky has released a very limited offering of special Bourbons named in honor of sixth-generation Master Distiller (and personal hero) Parker Beam. The most recent, which hit store shelves late last year is an altogether extraordinary bottling rightly meant for the true Bourbon connoisseur.

Given ten years of barrel age on the top floors of the distillery’s rickhouses, non-chill filitered and bottled at cask strength, the 2010 edition of Parker’s Heritage Collection employs corn, malted barley and Kentucky winter wheat in its mash bill rather than Heaven Hill’s usual mix of corn, barley and rye. This wheated mashbill makes for a decidedly rounder texture, a little more sweetness and a little less spice than the more conventional recipe. It also makes for a wonderfully rich dram of what Kentucky does best. Sporting layers and layers of caramel, sweet smoke, vanilla and maple, it is about as complex as Bourbon gets, and it lingers with a finish that seems to go on forever. At over 120 proof, it may strike some as being a bit hot for sipping neat, but serious whiskey aficionados are unlikely to quibble, and a few drops of water will both smooth off its edges and allow its already expansive aromas to bloom. It is, dear friends, most assuredly NOT a Bourbon that belongs in mixed drinks.

If there is a downside at all, it is that it is not cheap (the best rarely is), nor is it in plentiful supply. Only four-hundred cases were made, so it means that its finding may require a bit of a search. Its suggested retail price is $80.00, and, while that is hardly small change by my or anyone else’s standards, it is as rich and complex and downright involving as any of the world’s great and decidedly more costly spirits.

Somehow it has escaped my notice in the local Bay Area market, but I happened on a couple of bottles last week in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I am trusting that I might find a few more closer to home. If not, a second trip to the Midwest just might be in order if that proves to be my only recourse. It is that good.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Hey, Wineries! Are You Ready To Pay Reviewers To Write About Your Wines?

Thu, 08 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If so, you should be making wine in New Zealand because you can pay writers down there to review your wines. And if they don’t like it, they won’t even run the reviews. Of course, they will keep your money anyhow.

There is a couple of considerably sleazier practices here at home, although I suspect that they are not widespread. Evidence exists, according to charges leveled in a recent editiorial, that a few unscrupulous individuals will post phony reviews on the agglomeration blog sites like Cellar Tracker and Snooth for a small under the table payment. Those reviews are far more pernicious than those coming out of New Zealand because the local versions are simply fabrications.

Now, I realize that there are ladies of the night who are engaged in accepting money for false love, but this is the first I have heard of wine prostitution. We are not talking about the occasional wayward blogger who will write reviews in exchange for wine, a practice that is bad enough. No this is out and out sluttery, and apparently it is being practiced right here in River City.

In the midst of my amazement, and in response to the original article at: http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/2011/09/pay-to-play-wine-reviewsits-all-good.html, a winemaker chimed in with a comment that he was asked for a $1,000 payment by a tasting magazine in exchange for printing his 90-point reviews with a label alongside. No payment, possibly no review. I just have asked the winemaker who tells that tale to name the magazine in question. It is too soon for a response so please stay tuned.

I am reminded of the old tale in which an attractive woman is offered $1,000,000 to sleep with a wealthy man one time and she says yes. “Well, how about $100,000”, she is then asked and agrees, that yes she would make herself available one time for $100,000. ‘

Well how about $1,000” comes the next question, and she answers, “no way, what do you think I am, a whore?” The retort: “We have already established what you are. We are just haggling about the price”.

Apparently, there are wine whores who will write phony reviews for money and winemagazine whores who threaten not to print highly positive reviews unless a large cash payment is advanced, in which case the review is guaranteed to be published.

I am not fond of the New Zealand system of paying for each review. In that case, something like $28 per bottle. But, that practice, which I roundly denounce anyhow, is a lot less pernicious than what some folks are doing right here in the good old U. S. of A. If the winemaker, whose Internet handle is El Jefe, tells us the name of the publication to which he has referred, I will pass it on to you. In the meantime, rest assured that it is not Connoisseurs’ Guide, and I am guessing (yes, guessing) that it is not folks like the Spectator, Wine Enthusiast, Parker, or Tanzer.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Monday Was Labor Day

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Monday was Labor day, and it seemed downright un-American not to fire up the grill and cook outside. As I have been on the road a good deal these last couple of weeks, I opted to let my kids choose the menu. Hamburgers, potato salad and corn-on-the-cob were the unanimous choices. Something cold, foamy and hoppy would have no doubt been a good beverage choice, but I was in the mood for something vinous, and since the kitchen counter was lined with a fair number of Pinots from recent CGCW tastings, Pinot Noir was elected pretty much by default.

Admittedly, sweet corn, catsup, pickles, etc., are not the first things I think of when planning a menu to show off Pinot at its best, but, more than simply being a handy choice, Pinot did seem a good candidate for dinner drinking as its rather temperate tannins make it a fine foil to foods that intimate a bit of sweetness. I have long found the more tannic reds to be made uncomfortably gruff and astringent when teamed with anything that smacked in the least of sweetness, and, truth be told, the few Pinots we tried did a dandy job in washing down the holiday meal. The fuller and fruitier ones such as the luscious August West Russian River Valley 2009 fared the best, but even those favoring structure such as the Mount Eden Vineyards Santa Cruz Mountains 2008 were tasty and surprisingly complementary guests at the table.

Now, Pinot has always struck me as one of the more accommodating red wines around, but I was surprised at just how well it worked with grilled corn in its husk that had been finished in a light lime aioli and rolled in ancho chile powder and a bit of crumbled Cotija cheese. Any number of fruity, low-tannin reds from Dolcetto to Grenache to lighter Zinfandel should also do the trick, and, given how well the corn tasted when washed down with a splash of Chandon’s Unoaked Pinot Noir Rose Carneros 2007, I suspect that most anything pink would be welcome as well.

This particular dish was inspired by classic Mexican street fare and is a simple, easy-to-prepare recipe we had been tinkering with hereabouts over the last several days. In all modestly, Monday’s version turned out to be so downright delicious that we plan on reprise service this weekend, and I thought I would share it here. Buen apetito!

4 ears of fresh, unhusked sweet corn
3 Tablespoons mayonnaise
1 Tablespoon fresh lime juice
¼ teaspoon garlic granules
1 Tablespoon ancho chile powder (or aleppo pepper, chile urfa, chile maresh, etc.)
¼ pound finely crumbled Cotija cheese
Mix mayonnaise, lime juice and garlic together and let sit while the corn is grilled.
Pull back but do not remove the husks from each year of corn. Remove all cork silk and rewrap each ear as tightly as possible. Grill over moderate heat turning until barely cooked, four to eight minutes depending on how sweet and tender your particular corn is.
When the corn is finished, simply spread one Tablespoon of sauce on each ear, roll lightly in the Cotija cheese and sprinkle with a pinch or two of ancho chile. Salt and pepper to taste.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Chardonnay: Fact Vs. Misinterpretation—DECANTER Gets It Wrong

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Decanter Magazine has just published an article about California Chardonnay that masquerades as a paean to a new, brisker style, but is, in reality, a hit piece that relies on half-truths and misinterpretations to make its point.

I try not to pick on articles like this because they represent a point of view, and we all have our own views of the world. But, when the author starts making things up and demeaning both fine wine and the people who like it, then that is a step too far.

Let me be clear, I don’t care what anybody likes. That is their business. But the Decanter article goes far beyond like and dislike, and in so doing, reinvents California history in the process. The chance to champion the increasingly popular restrained style of Chardonnay gets lost along the way and asks to be set right. There is no disagreement on my part that Chardonnay is becoming lighter and higher in acidity for many upscale producers. It is a trend that has been going on for some time now, and it is not new. Moreover, the style is not a new style in California. Nor is it one that has not existed continuously.

Let’s start with the initial comment for it sets the tone for a series of misstatements and missteps that follow. In offering the quote, “Chardonnay is in the midst of a comeback tour”, the author suggests that Chardonnay had gone somewhere, and that this “somewhere” was some vinous backwater where the world stopped liking it. Given that Chardonnay is the single most widely planted grape in California and that its sales have remained strong, it is absurd to then write, “The ‘Anything But Chardonnay’ movement left the grape with deep scars.”

Frankly, the only folk who abandoned California Chardonnay were the geeks, the insiders, the folks whose narrow view of the world is supposed to be everyone else’s. These are the folks who write that Russian River Pinot Noir is failing because it has become a commodity even though small wineries are being priced out of that competition because the demand for grapes is so high that they cannot afford to buy them. These are the folks who call Napa Cabernet a parody of itself despite the fact that the demand for it slowed only a little in the recession and has already picked up ahead of the economy. These folks are not talking about wine quality but their own pinched vision of the world. If you disagree with them, you are an “apologist”.

Here is the sad proof that the author offers for the downfall of Chardonnay. Jess Jackson did it all through his Vintner’s Reserve Chardonnay. What hooey. To be sure, that style of inexpensive Chardonnay, with its slight boost from a spoonful of sugar, did become very popular. But to suggest that K-J’s wine somehow represented where California Chardonnay went for a couple of decades is flat out wrong. The author offers wineries like Peay and Donkey and Goat as members of the new direction, and no one would argue that their wines have been lower in alcohol and higher in acidity than many of their peers. They make very good Chardonnay that has rated well in Connoisseurs’ Guide.

But, citing those small, hand-crafted wines as evidence of anything is to ignore two major facts. The first is that wineries like Mount Eden, Cuvaison, Gary Farrell, Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, Au Bon Climat and dozens of others have been making lower alcohol, higher acidity Chardonnays for four decades without letup, and, secondly and perhaps more importantly, that they make and have always made scads more wine than Peay or Donkey and Goat or Lioco has ever made. For sure, size is not quality. But size is also not an ocean of sweet, simple wine.

The author then says the K-J, as of 1982, became the defining style of Chardonnay. Of course, he also calls it “the damning style”. So, let’s get this straight once and for all. Kendall-Jackson Vintner’s Reserve, at $10 or so, did not define Chardonnay for all of California. It did not define Chardonnay for most of the labels in California. And, while a few up-scale labels imitated the style, such as Rombauer, the overwhelming majority of up-scale California Chardonnay, of the type the geeks like me drink, never ever contained residual sugar.

It is preposterous to compare K-J Vintner’s Reserve with the wines of Robert Mondavi, Morgan, Talley, Ojai, Franciscan, Rodney Strong, Ramey, Paul Hobbs, Lewis, Freestone, Flowers, Varner, Dutton Goldfield, Dehlinger, Sonoma-Cutrer. And if needs be, I can rattle off a couple of hundred other serious Chardonnay producers whose wines would not be confused with K-J by anybody with a reasonable understanding of the whole picture in California.

Here is another piece of surprising silliness that is offered in the Decanter article. “Even today, a Boomer preference lingers for the buttery style that the quintessential Napa example of Rombauer . . . .”. The implication, of course, is that the Baby Boomer generation is wed to the Rombauer Chardonnay. Yet, consider this. Rombauer Chardonnay is sweet. It is not buttery. It is sweet. And to suggest that a sweet Chardonnay is “the quintessential Napa example” is so wrong and wrong-headed as to be not just misinterpretation, but a mistake of significant proportion. We are not talking about his opinion versus my opinion here. We are talking about fact. Rombauer Chardonnay is not a quintessential anything as relates to what Napa produces by way of Chardonnay.

Because the article is so wrong on this basic fact, it relies on its mistake by stating that this trend set the stage “for Chardonnay as travesty”. Well, folks, I must apologize to you for going on at such lengths. I just cannot find a way to forgive a writer who equates most upscale California Chardonnay with the Rombauer style. It is nothing more than one style. And it is a style that is neither quintessential nor dominant among the wines that I review or the wines that the author, who after all is the wine editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, reviews. Yet, in his wholesale condemnation of the majority of all California Chardonnay, not just a few sweet, soft wines, he demeans most coastally grown bottlings and thus demeans the people who drink them.

Spare me your angry letters, you sycophants who think that the new Chardonnay was just invented. It has existed since Chardonnay came out of hiding in the 1960s, was compounded in the 1970s with the plantings of 20,000 acres of grapes and led the way to the expansion of the 1980s and early 90s that saw Chardonnay acreage grew to 100,000. No one is arguing that all that Chardonnay makes great wine, but much of it does and always has done. The author calls Chardonnay “a travesty”. He is wrong, and his resort to mistakes, misinterpretations and damnations of every wine satisfying his singular scope comes a lot closer to travesty in my view.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
You Never Know Where Great Wine Will Be Grown

Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

One of the great joys about hopping into a car and hitting the road for a long trip is that you never know what might lie around the next bend in the highway. I like to drive, and I like to drive long distances. You see and sense things about people and places that are impossible to grasp when flying over them. And, there is always the chance, maybe the likelihood is a better word, for surprise discoveries that make the trip far more memorable than the destination.

It has been vacation time here at CGCW, and while rolling through Western Colorado early this week and making a wrong turn off Interstate 70, I unexpectedly found myself surrounded by vineyards with billboards announcing that I was now in wine country. Now, I knew full well that I was a thousand miles short of anything that I knew as “wine country”, but curiosity being what it is, the compulsion to explore overcame any notion of schedules or a need to rack up so many more miles before day’s end.

It turns out that I had inadvertently discovered Colorado’s Grand Valley AVA, and we put on our tourist hats and took a turn up the first vine-lined driveway that came our way, one belonging to Canyon Wind Wine Cellars in Palisades. What started out as an impromptu and anonymous visit to a winery tasting room quickly turned into something else. The wines were quite good and compelled jotting down a few tasting notes rather than just sipping and smiling and hitting the road. Upon seeing me scribbling at the counter, our host for the day observed that we must be from California as Californians were the only ones who ever took notes, and his suspicions, he said, were confirmed when we asked for a spit-bucket rather than gulping down every last drop as was apparently the custom thereabouts.

From a refreshing Pinot Grigio and a firm, well-structured Sauvignon Blanc to a solid, currant Cabernet Sauvignon and a surprisingly sophisticated Bordelaise blend bearing the title “IV”, the winery’s offerings, all from local estate vineyards, were far better than anything I was expecting, and the Cabernet Franc, a grape that is rarely my favorite, was a bright and buoyant bottling that was nothing short of a revelation. I commented that the latter was very much in the Loire Valley style, and I was quickly corrected that no, it was made in the Colorado style. The winery was justifiably proud of its efforts, and I was once again reminded of the wisdom of not judging a book by its cover. It is not about labels or appellations or alcohol levels, it is about tasting wines one at a time. These were professional, well-crafted varietal wines of real depth and intent, and they were not in the least embarrassed by comparisons with the West Coast cousins.

So much of the day was spent sipping, spitting and talking that there was no time left to explore the Grand Valley district further, but an extended stay in Colorado wine country is very much on the agenda next Spring when the weather warms and the road once again beckons.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Who Appointed You a Winewriter?

Thu, 01 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I like to think that I am a nice guy. But, on occasion, I can be a very prickly bastard. Stay tuned because I am about to walk the line between considerate, civilized writer and edgy curmudgeon.

My friend and fellow winewriter yesterday unburdened himself of his baggage and confessed that anyone could learn to taste wine. I agree. But I demur beyond that point because there is talent, pure talent in what he does that separates him from most wine drinkers and even from most wine bloggers. Joe has ability borne, admittedly, from hard work both as a writer and as a taster. And, he will continue to get better and better because his knowledge base will continue to grow.

I got a little huffy (apologies to Joe, my adopted internet son) over on his blog today with my comments that follow. In my view, Joe sells himself short, and in so doing, sells all of us who work to hone our writing, tasting, wine appreciation skills short. Read on and decide for yourself if I am being to hard on the lad. His blog can be found at: http://www.1winedude.com/.

My comments, not all of which I published to his blog entry, are as follows:

Joe,

It is unarguably true that anyone who can differentiate between hamburgers that he or she likes and say why with more than monosyllabic grunts can learn to do the same thing with wine. But just as great chefs and food critics know more about hamburgers than I do, surely you and I know more about wine than my well-educated, middle-class neighbors.

I don't know much about your basketball skills, but I would speculate that even if you were 6' 8", you could not hit a 30 foot "J" as well as Messrs. James and Bryant.

The point is that practice can make better, but exceptional is still exceptional, and that is as true in winetasting as it is in winemaking as it is in basketball.

Joe, my son, you give yourself too little credit. The reason why you are a famous and revered winewriter is down to more than just 10,000 hours of dedication. It is also down to capability. My grandfather, an uneducated immigrant, was a wonderful finish carpenter. No one taught him how to do it. He could just do it. Two of his five sons, including my father, inherited that capability although they turned out to be an architect and a professor of pathology.

I am not saying that the rest of us cannot wield a saw and hammer but could we turn a balustrade even with 10,000 hours of practice? Not necessarily. The same is true in winetasting. Not everyone can be an expert just by application and effort. But, just as I do not need to be able to do finish carpentry, so too do my well-educated, solidly middle-class neighbors not need to be able to know that the scent they like, or do not like in their Chardonnay, is the result of malolactic fermentation or new barrels or sur lie aging.

You and I do, but they do not. And, given my long experience in tasting alongside winemakers here in CA, I can tell you that each palate is different regardless of how much time it has put in tasting wine. People do not need to be afraid of wine, and frankly, most of ny neighbors are not, but they also do not need 10,000 hours of application to know enough to differentiate between fruit and oak, between sulfites and grass, between high acid and low acid. I realize that this latter comment is consistent with your message, but it is not immodest on your or my parts to think that we can differentiate more than my neighbors and can explain what we can differentiate. If we cannot, we are in the wrong business. That is why you are famous and I am trying to follow in your footsteps.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Take The Lamb Chop, Please—And Bring Me A Red Wine

Wed, 31 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have a soft spot in my heart for lamb chops. They were one of the few foods that my sainted mother could cook really well, and, my sainted wife, well, she cooks a lot better than my mother and she too cooks lamb chops really well.

You might think that lamb chops are an easy food to match with wine. They are red, rich and juicy, and if you look closely enough, every producer of red wine, save perhaps those who make sparkling Shiraz, will put lamb somewhere on their lists of highly recommended food to go with their Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Syrah and Zinfandel, Chianti and Chinon, Lemburger and Lagrein.

But, in those recommendations, if you look closely enough, you see the nub of the problem. If a lamb chop goes with everything, then nothing it goes with stands out. And wine geeks like me, when we are sent to our cellars by our sainted wives to get something to serve with the lamb chops, are confronted with a mountain of choices and not one of them is any better than any of the others. That is not good, not good at all. Wine and food does not work that way. There must be some really good, better than the others, choices that are totally classic and push all others to the sidelines.

And so, I have gone in search of the single most outstanding lamb chop and red wine combination. It is a daunting task—this business of eating lamb chops three meals a day for weeks on end. Why could not have the problem been oysters and wine or caviar and wine or fois gras and wine? I like lamb chops as much as the next guy, and, did I mention that my sainted wife cooks them really well? The quest is on. The challenge has been taken up.

Tonight for instance, I drank sixteen different Pinot Noirs with my lamb chops. I did spit most of it out, of course. I am a professional after all. But I must confess, I did like the Adelaida Estate Pinot quite a bit with my chop, and the Belle Glos Taylor Vineyard rated right up there as well. But the wine of the night with the lamb turned out to be the Wesmar 2008 Balletto Vineyard. It was an easy choice when you get right down to it. It was the most expensive wine on the table so it won.

Oh, sure, you are about to say something like “there he goes again” or “don’t be facetious”. Well, you’ve only yourselves to blame. You should never have let me begin-—not unless you have the answer to the question. Well, do you?

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Different Is Different—But Is It Better

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I spent part of my just completed vacation trying to explain the difference between “different and better” to my neighbors at Tahoe. They have heard of new grapes and new techniques and wanted to know what it all means.

I guess, because I was the nearest thing to someone who might know the answers to those questions, that we spent a happy evening over a chilled bottle of high acid Sauvignon Blanc followed by a ripe and rich Zinfandel discussing those weighty topics instead of telling tales about hurricanes we had lived through and baseball pennant chases. And I am happy to share the “truth” about that topic.

Here it is in a nutshell. For as long as I have been wine cognizant, which means from the days when I stepped up from Gallo Hearty Burgundy to Beringer Ruby Cabernet and then to cheap Beaujolais and to Chianti in wicker raffia, the “new thing”, or “the next big thing” has always been with us. It began with the Cabernet vintages of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, and was compounded by Zinfandels from Ridge, Joseph Swan and Sutter Home, Chardonnays from Mayacamas, David Bruce and Freemark Abbey and Pinot Noirs from Chalone and Mount Eden and continued unabated over the almost four decades now that I have been collecting.

There is always a new darling, a latest cult wine, a next big thing. It is the ongoing discovery of wine’s potential here in California that has been the basis and backbone of our wine industry. True enough, with 100,000 acres of Chardonnay and 75.000 more of Cabernet Sauvignon, we have entered a period of what might be stability at the heart. To some, that means “boring” while, to others, that means recognizable styles and quality and faith that a dictionary and an atlas in no longer necessary to enjoy bottle after bottle of very good wine being sold at reasonable prices.

For those who see “boring” in stability, there is hope. Even with the great majority of California’s wine grapes concentrated in a few varieties, the thrill of discovery has not left the scene. There are those who see excitement in old varieties like Burger and Grey Riesling that were left behind for good reason. I do not. But, I do see excitement in the new attempts to capture the grandeur of Riesling. California may have failed once with Riesling, but just as Pinot Noir has succeeded by being planted in more accommodating microclimates and soils, so too can Riesling.

And California wineries, whether JC Cellars with its Rhône bottlings or Spottswoode with its Sauvignon Blanc, are still experimenting with and learning new fermentation techniques such as the use of small cement containers in order to achieve a fuller mouthfeel without having to search for higher alcohols or softer acidities. New varieties are also the center of experimentation for those who are bored with Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah and Merlot.

And so the question pertains. Does all this mean that different is better? In my wine lifetime, it very frequently has. I am just not so sure how much of today’s “different” will truly be better and how much of it will be Nebbiolo and Sangiovese, two varieties that simply did not satisfy despite being different and now have very little or no place in California wine discussions these days. I like different. I always have. But I like better better, and different is not always better just because it is different.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Go Read The Blogs—I Did and Was Amazed

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Not that things are all wrong, but that even the top blogs have me scratching my head today. I guess that is what comes of being on vacation—having time to read and being surprised by the good, the bad and the ugly in the blogs.

ITEM No. 1: FAKE WINE REVIEWS: Do They Matter?
It is not that Tom Wark asked this question, because his answer is “Hell, yes, they matter”. No it is not that Mr. Wark has got it wrong. It is the comments on his blog that make me scratch my head in puzzlement. Can you believe one commenter suggested that it was okay for small wineries to post phony reviews on places like Amazon and Yelp and Cellar Tracker? This same person then goes on to say that Wine Spectator reviews of 90 points are given to wineries who advertise there.

Now, whatever your position on big vs. small, Wine Spectator scoring, sites that agglomerate ratings from lots of wine drinkers or any other way in which wine reviews are created, there are two things in this debate that are just plain wrong. Any fake wine review is a scam; there can be no two sides to this discussion. And, no matter what one thinks of WS reviews, the absolute fact is that the people who write them taste blind and their 90-point ratings far outnumber their advertisers by a fact of ten or twenty to one.

Nonsense is nonsense, folks. Mr. Wark set out to expose nonsense and uncovered a lot more of it.

ITEM No. 2: THE TWITTER BUZZ—Or Not???
Steve Heimoff is a Twitter skeptic. He has been forever, and so it does not surprise that his answer is “Probably not”. But, then people starting piling on Heimoff saying that he did not understand. Apparently, one person discovered Bonny Doon Vineyards on Twitter. And a winery owner claimed that she was selling 90% of her output through Twitter.

OK, I get it. I like Twitter. I manage to post there one or twice a week. I try my darndest to post things that will lead to comments and also bring folks to this blog. Does it work? Yes and no. But, if I tried to make living based on returns from Twitter, I would have retired long ago. And, while Bonny Doon may sell some wine via Twitter, its production is simply too great to rely on Twitter for more than small blips.

Wine is simply too complicated, too complex to be consigned to a series of 140 character tweets. It is one thing to get some extra attention, but there is so far no evidence that Twitter is about to change the world. I agree with Steve Heimoff, but I keep on tweeting because it also does not hurt.

ITEM No. 3: OREGON PINOT GRIS: Super Star or Super Simple?
Ryan Reichardt, writing in Palate Press, asks whether the Oregon Wine Industry is trying to reach a bridge too far with its attempt to turn its Pinot Gris into a wine with the wide and positive recognition that its Pinot Noir enjoys. To put it mildly, he is skeptical.

And I have to agree with him. Despite the fact that Oregon wineries would like to find a second wine to tout alongside their Pinot Noir, I sense that they are trying too hard. Oregon Pinot Noir earned its reputation because of the quality it delivered. There is nothing wrong with Oregon Pinot Gris, but the problem is that there is nothing magical about it either.

There is an argument being made that Pinot Gris can essentially imitate the rise from lesser status that has been exhibited by Petite Sirah. That is a very tall order. Petite Sirah made a comeback because of two major factors. The first is that there was always potential in the grape for depth and longevity, and thus desirability as a collectible, and the second is that well-made Petite Sirah offers as much to like as any red grape save for Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir. Yet, even with all that potential now being realized Petite Sirah trails Cab. S., PN, Merlot, Zin and Syrah in acreage. It is a successful grape but not a powerhouse.

That leads me to this conclusion: The way to sell more Oregon Pinot Gris is to make more of it in styles that emphasize its easy fruit. And then to price it right. Whether anything grown in Oregon can ever be priced at popular levels is unclear at this point. I will leave it to others to analyze why, but with lots of good Riesling coming from both Washington and California in the ten to twelve dollar range, there is a real question as to the ability of Oregon Pinot Gris to get inside of that pricing let alone to compete across the board on a qualitative level.

“Super Star or Super Simple” is the wrong question. The wine is always going to be simple. It is Pinot Gris and it has almost never made great wine. Given that reality, perhaps trying to tie Pinot Gris to Pinot Noir is simply too big a reach. And, if that is so, then “Super Simple” may actually be Oregon’s best hope.

ITEM No. 4: JOEL PETERSON: Twenty Year Celebration
Sometimes headlines are just too neat, too clean, too honest. Joel Peterson, in whose inspiration Ravenswood was founded in the 1970s, has clearly been around for more than twenty years. Yet, the twenty year headline was about Peterson, not the great Ravenswood site north of Sonoma. My bad, because I misread it and was about to comment about Mr. Peterson’s status when I read it again.

The party at Ravenswood is to celebrate the site. It sounds like a fabulous party. And at $20 for first tastes of the new vineyard-designate Zins, great food and a chance to rub elbows with Joel Peterson and several Ravenswood growers may not be a Peterson party per se, but it is still a great party.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Gone Fishin’

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I see that my friend Alder Yarrow has gone to Alaska to catch fish. I have gone to Lake Tahoe, and I am catching fish in the restaurants. I almost feel guilty not doing my morning blog. Nah, no I don’t.

I may post something tomorrow. Today, we are taking the grandkids to the Lake where they may see fish, but mostly will see sand and water and a variety of sailing craft. After lunch, we will visit the National Forest, have a late afternoon swim, play a little volleyball or soccer and then it is dinner and a family movie.

I would love to say that I am free of wine, but, of course, the September issue of Connoisseurs’ Guide will not wait so I spend a bit of time each day with final edits. Today, it is the Sauvignon Blanc tasting notes that will get my attention between trips to the Lake and forests.

Funny thing is that wine is always around the corner—or in this case, next door and across the way. The immediate neighbors to our place are active collectors and we have already had interesting conversations. We have not yet met the neighbors across the way, but according to the folks next door, who seem to know everybody, those other folks own several small vineyards in Monterey and make their own wine.

The kids are already out the door to the volleyball pit and playground, and Grandpa is on his way after them.

More tomorrow—about wine.

Thursday Thorns
My Way or The Highway

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It may be true that there can be no disputes in matters of taste, but you would not know it lately as first one point of view and then another get tossed out as the “truth” to the exclusion of everything else.

Both Dan Berger and Matt Kramer have written of this phenomenon in just the past few days. Berger was told in no uncertain terms that there were no good Aussie wines—all too big, too fat, too heavy. Aside from the fact that Mr. Berger dislikes wines of that style but likes Aussie wines, it is simply absurd to toss every Aussie wine in one big cesspool. Yet, that is the very thing that someone said to Mr. Berger and to which Mr. Berger took exception.

Matt Kramer had a similar experience with a different topic—this time California Pinot Noir. Matt lives up north of us in Oregon, or little California as the newly arrived from our state call it. He was having a conversation with a local wine person and was told in convinced language t too closely paralleling the Berger experience that California Pinot suffered all the defects of excess. Mr. Kramer managed to find a wine on the list that he says convinced his dining partner of the error of his ways.

Only last week, we had the spectacle of the Score Revolutionists, or, as I like to call them, the Score Destructionists, telling us that anyone who uses scores in writing wine reviews and anyone who reads them is out of touch with the times. Never mind that millions of people subscribe to wine review publications all over the globe and that those reviews virtually all use some sort of grading hierarchy. Everyone who disagreed with the Destructionists was wrong. Just look back at the comments here and over on Tom Wark’s blog to see how very emotionally those folks take their position.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I do believe that there are no disputes in matters of taste. If you tell me that you have tasted a particular wine and you did not like it, then that is the truth for you as regards that wine. But if you don’t like the AVA system in this country or don’t like the fruit in many California wines and thus think that those of us who do are not only wrong but are dupes, dunces and palate-deficient, then you have taken the argument too far. Wine is first about individual bottles, and broad-brush generalizations of the type hurled around recently are too easily proved wrong.

Let’s go back to Australia for a moment. It has a wide variety of growing conditions from hot and flat to hilly and cool. It can produce rich, viscous Syrah (Shiraz to them) and it can produce balanced Syrah, but it can also produce tight, cool-climate Syrah as well. There is no “one size fits all” in Australia any more than there is in California. Maybe there are stronger similarities in the way varieties are expressed in France, but please tell me how much Pinot Noir is grown outside of a narrow stretch of land in Burgundy or how much Cabernet Sauvignon is planted outside of Bordeaux.

It is easy enough to disprove the claims of the narrow-minded when it comes to wine. That is really not the issue that Dan or Matt or CGCW has been tackling for some time now. This blog has periodically asked for civility and humility on the parts of folks in the wine community. But what do we get? Comments on this blog from someone complaining about California Rosé because he tasted one and it was 16.1% in alcohol and he thinks it was a blend of white and red rather than a lightly colored wine from red grapes. His conclusion: California Rosé is to be ignored. Did he come back and read Steve Eliot’s excellent piece yesterday about Rosé? No, that would take patience and an open mind.

There is nothing wrong with personal preference built up over time. I am not fond of and do not care to drink a lot of Gruner Veltliner, but I don’t put down those who like it. Yet, somehow, in today’s world, the debates have grown more strident—and thus more silly. Like what you like, but let’s stop the practice of denigrating entire classes of wines because of personal preference. If you try that silly trick, someone is going to prove you wrong.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Rosé—It’s For Wine Lovers, Not Wine Snobs

Wed, 17 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

If you think any pink wine is cheap plonk, do not read on. If you turn your nose up and walk away when the Rosé hits the table, keep right on going. But, if you are open to interesting ideas, I’ve got some that work.

I confess that I like a well-made Rosé, and there are plenty of folks who do as well. Most anyone who pays even cursory attention to wine knows that Rosé has gained new fashionability over the last half-dozen or so years, and there is a good deal of the stuff, both good and bad, to be found on fine wine lists and retailers’ shelves.

Now, I remember with wincing nostalgia too many empty Mateus flagons – an apparent favorite of one Saddam Hussein, by the way -- from my college years, but the last half-dozen years or so have seen such a rise in interest of better-made wines that the coming of age of good Rosé is now longer a breaking story. There are brilliant bottlings from the south of France and wonderfully tasty offerings from Spain’s Rioja and Navarra regions. There are terrific versions made from North Coast Pinot hereabouts in California and some downright delicious examples from Grenache further south.

I suppose that, in part, I like good Rosés so much is that they are rarely the stuff of controversy. It is not a fashionable target for terroirists and rarely held up to scrutiny by those obsessed with authenticity. At worst, it is a wine dismissed by would-be wine snobs as candied, big-winery plonk, but, if you hold those views, it is very much time to think again. While even the new devotees of Rosé all too often see the stuff solely in terms of freshness and fruity quaffability, the best can be wines of real interest and depth; wines that can fit in beautifully with a serious meal.

That point was driven home a couple of times during dinners this past week when a random Rosé selection turned out be the wine of the night. The first, a bottle of the 2010 Etude Pinot Noir Rosé, poured at home as an afterthought with a platter of pimenton-laced Spanish white beans and chicken linguisa matched up beautifully with the recipe’s rich-but-not-too-heavy flavors.

The 2010 Goldeneye Vin Gris of Pinot Noir chosen the next night at Lafayette’s Artisan Bistro was as involving as it was refreshing, and it served as a remarkable bridge between an opening course of gazpacho of heirloom tomatoes, Dungeness crab and avocado sorbet and subsequent plates of roasted pork served with black-eyed peas, pickled peaches and mustard jus and a ballontine of sous vide chicken nestled atop red, Bhutanese rice and beans seasoned with ras el hanout. As complex and composed as each dish turned out, our bottle fit in seamlessly and added its own touch of interest to the mix.

I frankly felt more than a little disappointed last night when the featured Fiddlehead “Pink Fiddle” Rosé was already sold out at Picán, one of our favorite Oakland haunts. Maybe next time.

Rosé may have lost its stigma, but it is high time that it earns a little respect. It can be so much more than an unceremonious warm-weather quaff.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Coming Out of The Closet

Tue, 16 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I am old enough now to tell the truth. A few of my friends have known, but I have kept the facts shielded away from public view. Time to fess up. My wine cellar used to be the closet of my wife’s sewing room.

Yes, it’s true. I started collecting wine in the early 1970s. Even in high school, when everyone else was drinking beer, I was drinking wine. Not sure why, except that I didn’t like beer all that much. But, one of my friends, the son of Italian immigrants who made wine in their basements and had it on the table every day of their lives just like in the old country, was a wine drinker and I found that I liked his tipple a lot more than the bitter brews that the rest of the guys would be drinking.

So, wine it was and continues to be. I did become a beer drinker along the way. Something about going to college and having a beer joint just down the street that served undergraduates as long as they behaved themselves. And then I discovered whiskey-—first bourbon and later Scotch whisky, which I liken to wine because of the many subtleties to its flavors that come from place, age and technique.

But, wine has always been number one for me, and when I started collecting, the first boxes went in the bottom of the closet of the spare bedroom. There was no problem at first. Those four or five boxes of Inglenook and Beaulieu, of Christian Brothers and Mirassou and Beringer were not the most expensive wines around.

And then I discovered great Chardonnay. Back in the day, the leading Chardonnays were from Chalone, Hanzell and Stony Hill, and they were being joined at the top of the collectible parade by newcomers named Spring Mountain, Freemark Abbey and Mount Eden. All of a sudden, a few boxes became ten or fifteen, and the wines became a lot more expensive on the one hand and longer aging on the other.

It was only months later that the red wine collectibles started. Chalone Pinots, Joseph Swan and Ridge Zinfandels, half a dozen or more different Cabernets from the fabulous vintages of 1968 and 1970, and the great but unheralded 1969, whose wines might have been more complex for some producers than the ‘68s and ‘70s. And now the wines began to own the closet. And, then they owned the room—because now I kept it dark all day long so as to keep the temperatures moderated and to allow my first wine cellar to function as well as possible.

My first wine cellar, the one that eventually had to come out of the closet, consisted of inch-thick sheets of Styrofoam formed into a box and held together by that staple of my limited handyman existence—duct tape. It was cooled by half-gallon milk bottle boxes filled with water and frozen overnight. Every day I would take three of them out of the freezer and put them into the box. At night, I would return them to the freezer for recycling into ice once again. This system worked perfectly well until I spilled one of those containers, and then the mold set in. About that time, my wife decided that she wanted her sewing room back.

And so it was that I took the back of our garage and built a 12 foot by six foot cold box that would hold about one hundred cases of wine. It seemed to me then that I would never own that much wine. I was wrong. Now I have three wine cellars and own far too much wine to ever drink or to use for Connoisseurs’ Guide retrospective tastings. And what became of the old sewing room? It was soon turned into the first Connoisseurs’ Guide office. And then it was combined with the adjoining bedroom to become and even larger office. We added on new bedrooms for the kids, because we had begun to collect them as well.

There are times when I still long for those good old days when I owned just a couple of dozen cases of wine and knew the location of every bottle without having to search around. I blame Connoisseurs’ Guide, of course. Once we got to tasting all the California wines on a regular basis, I just had to have a few bottles of each of the best. I guess I don’t really regret it—that coming out of the closet. I have been tasting wines for a living for over three decades now. On the whole, I might rather have been a great baseball player, but one thing is sure. I have lasted longer than those guys, and I still don’t have time to play golf. Not when there are new wines to discover and a few places left in the wine cellar.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
California Becomes France and France Becomes California

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Global warming is destroying France. Every year gets warmer and earlier in the vineyards. The grapes are riper, and the wines have already changed even though some Francophiles refuse to admit it.

In the meantime, coastal California is getting cooler and cooler. It is our natural air conditioning, the refreshing fogs and ocean breezes that are responsible for our wonderful climate—except that here on the coast, global warming works in reverse. As the interior heats up, the cooling effects of the Pacific Ocean rushing in to put out the fiery heat gets stronger. And as it gets stronger, it makes the coast colder—which, in effect, makes our harvests later, longer and ripens our grapes are lower sugar levels.

And as these phenomena repeat and increase, California is going to have a climate more like France and France is going to overheat and will have no choice but to pick super-ripe intense grapes or to harvest its grapes in July and August. But when the temperatures heat up, there are two other phenomena that come into play.

We in California know them well. Grapes picked earlier in warmer climates may have adequate sugars but do not have mature flavors. All those lighter, lower alcohol French wines are about to become green if the picking sugars do not rise. By contrast, grapes picked at physiological ripeness will be very intense, full of flavor, a delight to drink, but they will be lower in acidity and higher in pH. And, in France, where the addition of acidity is not allowed, the wines are going to get flatter and flatter in character.

Ultimately, the laws in France are going to change. We have already seen harvests where the Government relented and allowed the watering of the vineyards. Sooner or later, the vineyardists are going to get their ways and established winemaking techniques that we use here all the time to make our incredibly successful wines will necessarily be allowed in France. Spinning cone alcohol reduction, acidulation, mega-purple, water replacement will all become more and more widespread in France even while they are being phased out here. We know this is true here. We have seen the dramatic increase in lower alcohol, higher acid wines that increased coastal cooling has made possible.

And when these shoes get on the other feet, we will witness the greatest conversion of belief since Martin Luther. All of the Francophile winelovers and wine critics, the ones who excoriate California wine for the very things that make it different and successful, will now find those very characteristics to be exactly what wine is meant to be. And what will they say of California? California wine will be too thin, too understated, too cerebral.

I know this to be true because I saw it all in a movie last night. No, not Mondovino. And not a movie about wine. I saw a French movie last night, complete with subtitles, and I loved it because it was French. I have always loved French movies. It is why I chose to study French while attending a “Latin” high school growing up in Boston. And, like those wine critics who cannot see past the end of their noses when French wines come to call, I can’t see past the screen when I am watching a French movie.

I get it. In movies, I am hip. In wine, I am fighting an uphill battle. But sooner or later, the shoe will be on the other foot. Look out France, here comes California wine.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Thoughts While Shaving: On Aging, On Wine Cellars, On Tom Wark

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have long done some of my best thinking while shaving. It has been harder to think lately, however, because of my recently acquired beard. But even a hairy guy needs a trim now and then, and here are a few pithy thoughts that have come out of the experience.

ON AGING—Part One: Wine gets better with age—most of the time. Whether the time frame is six months or sixteen years is not really the issue. Most wines simply like a bit of age. First they need to shed their grapey, fresh-pressed baby fat. Most wineries keep their offerings long enough for that to happen, but not long enough for the aging curve to have given us the best the wines have to offer. Unoaked, simple wines probably don’t have much to gain, but even they can be too clean, too scrubbed if issued very young.

I was writing the tasting notes on a bunch of 2010 Sauvignon Blancs last night, and so many of those wines were still in their infancy—even the inexpensive ones. And, because they are so close to their bottling dates, there were also far too many wines whose protective sulfur dioxide were intruding with matchsticky, dusty, vaguely dried out grass notes. To be sure, the good wines are going to outlive that problem, and it won’t take them months to do it. Still, I wish wineries felt that they could hold off issuing wines that are not really ready for prime time. Heck, some of them weren’t ready for adolescence.

ON AGING—Part Two: The other day, a young and not very polite person decided to tell me that I was past my sell-by date as a winewriter. The essence of his message was “you are sixty-three; I am thirty-three; and you are out of touch with the way the world wants wine reviews to be done”. Now, I can’t argue with the first part of his premise. I am all of sixty-three and have been at this stand for three decades and change. In fact, I have been at it for more years than he has been alive. And that may well make me past my useful age and I need to carted out to pasture, but I am not so sure that being thirty-three qualifies my young friend to be the voice of experience.

One of the most interesting things that has happened to me as a taster of late is that my tasting acuity is changing. On the one hand, I am less likely to dash off strings of adjectives, yet, on the other, I am much more likely to spend lots of time looking at varietal consistency, suggestions of place, ageworthy structures and the like. Those kinds of recognitions are, in fact, borne of experience. My granddaughter can smell wine and tell me whether it is redolent of flowers or berries. I am sure my thirty-three year old friend is also capable of that feat. But I am betting my years in this biz has prepared me better than most youngsters to be able to pick West Rutherford from East Rutherford and the Freestone region of the Russian River Valley from the Westside Road section. Age does have its benefits, and just like fine wine, I may not be as spry as I once was, but I am a lot more complex.

ON WINE CELLARS: A good friend of mine and long-time subscriber came for a visit not so long ago. He lives overseas and imports a fair bit of California wine. We get together about once a decade and have done so several times. Because he was coming down from wine country and catching a plane the next day, he stayed with us and happened to find himself face to face with the overflow from my wine cellar. I justify keeping thousands of bottles of wine on three or four different grounds, and, believe me, I rely on each of those pleadings to stop Mrs. Olken from tossing me and them out into the street.

A few weeks ago, I pulled out a 1975 Joseph Swan Zinfandel for a group of winewriting friends who had gathered up Sonomaway for our occasional breadbreaking. The wine was spectacular—although truth be told, I did bring a backup bottle in case that one had lost its way. Last weekend, I joined a very different kind of dinner party. My writing compatriot, Steve Eliot, has often mentioned that he also has taught wine to the fledgling chefs who attend the California Culinary Academy. Several of the instructors from that organization joined in a multi-course meal, and the Olkens were invited. This time, I reached into the cellar for an older Alsatian Riesling, a 1997 Trimbach Cuvée Emile. It had all the ripe but steely character I want from an Alsatian version of the grape. Being able to enjoy wines that have aged into great beauty is one of the best reasons to have a wine cellar. I can haul out several other “excuses” as needed.

ON TOM WARK: The inestimable Mr. Wark, for those who do not know him, is a wine publicist. He is also an exceptional wine columnist whose blog, Fermentation, http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/, is one of the most insightful, intelligently analytical endeavors in the wine internet space. If you do not read it regularly, I urge you to start now. Most of us who blog about wine are critics of one sort or another. We have views that must, of needs, be substantially borne from our experiences in that part of the wine scene. Mr. Wark comes from a different place, and while he and the critics often speak about the same topics, most recently the kerfuffle over wine ratings that momentarily burst into flame in the last week or so, he also has unique insights into the industry from the other side. The beauty of his blog is not that he speaks for the industry, which he may or may not do, but he knows the other side of the coin and thus makes all of us who read him into smarter people.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Tributes
Boston Wine Lists Teach San Francisco A Lesson

Thu, 11 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I grew up in Boston. Left town for grad school out here and never looked back. But, I did go back last week, and to my surprise, I found California wine everywhere and at good prices. Boston, good on ya.

Now, I am not saying that other places back east are less hospitable. I know of one or two restaurants in New York that do have a California wine on their lists. Sure, the prices are inflated, but at least they are there. But not like Boston.

In Boston, for example, I found a La Follette Pinot Noir on a wine list for $39, just a little over retail. And I asked the proprietor how it was that he priced his wines that way, and then expressed my surprise that he had a pretty good selection of California wines. His response was wonderfully revealing. “I have a lot of customers who are not students of wine but who like a good bottle with dinner. They find California wine much more approachable than wines from Europe with names they don’t understand and cannot pronounce.”

Wow. I thought that was an argument from thirty years ago, but there it was again. Like my neighbors here in California, the broad, educated middle class in Boston has become wine drinkers. And like my neighbors, they like wine but they have not made a fetish out of their interest in it. They like seeing names they recognize instead of needing a wine encyclopedia and three years worth of wine publications to be able to make a choice from the list.

Even in San Francisco, it is the rare list in a good restaurant that contains names like Franciscan and Beaulieu and, heaven forbid, Castle Rock. I looked around this fellow’s establishment, as instructed, and he was right, there was a bottle on almost every table. And while this was a very good restaurant, it was no “nose in the air”, wait staff in formal attire place. It’s a good thing that I did not ask for the sommelier. There wasn’t one.

I found this phenomenon repeated a couple of times over in other places I visited, and while we never set foot in the absolutely top-rated places whose lists I am sure are snootier and whose staff does, of course, include a sommelier, it was certainly a treat to see wine lists that did not pat themselves on the back for their “brilliance”.

I came home thinking that there are times when I look at lists here in San Francisco and wonder if the makers of those lists even know we are in California. I get it that my local Italian restaurant, run by a genuine native from Tuscany, has only Italian wines on the list. But, I am less than happy when I see lists that have few local wines despite the claim made by virtually every decent restaurant in this town that it relies on fresh, local ingredients.

San Francisco, you could take a page out of Boston’s book. Keep your wine prices reasonable and make your lists friendlier.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Did Someone Recommend Syrah With My Oysters?

Wed, 10 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I will try almost any wine and food combination, but do not, please, ask me to try my fresh-shucked oysters with a heavy, tannic Syrah. Being open-minded does not mean ignoring the lessons of experience.

One thing that is different about CGCW is that our reviews and descriptions about wine are never based on one person’s palate. We do not taste wines alone. We work with any number of experienced tasters, and we work hard to find consensus. That is not to say that there is always agreement, and there are times when consensus does not come, but the process is one of shared enjoyment, respect and thoughtful exchange. I similarly think that the great pleasures of pairing wine and food are rarely found in dining alone.

I often think that the table is the last refuge of civilization. I have long ago forgotten just who said it --Hemingway seems a good guess -- but the words “eating alone is like dying” have lingered quietly and indelibly for more years than I would like to admit. They still have the ring of truth. Oh, I can recall hiding from the world and sitting at a table for one and finding real serenity in washing down oysters with a half-bottle from Reims, and I do not need company to enjoy the right glass of Beaujolais with the perfect burger, but it is the shared moment, the communion of the table, if you will, where for me good wine most comes to life. And, while always respecting the notion of “to each his own”, I take very seriously the task of picking of wines to go with certain courses when charged with the privilege of looking after family and friends.

I commented in agreement last week on one blogger’s acceptance that there might be something to the idea that there are useful, general guidelines concerning how food and wine might match up. I realize that there are those who feel that such guidelines make the subject of wine more complex and thus drive folks away from even trying to pair up a good bottle with a good meal. I get the idea. I just do not agree.

I wonder, in fact, whether the task does not become more difficult when one has no guidelines at all, and I find it difficult believe that most consumers are bamboozled by notions about which wine does and does not work with which food and thus throw up their hands in frustration and drink beer or coca-cola with their beef stroganoff or seared duck breast.

While I agree without reservation with the idea that there is no absolute “good” nor absolute “bad” when it comes to taste, I have learned many things from a good many smart and experienced people over the years that have added immeasurably to my love and appreciation of food and wine.

I am not frozen and incapable of making my own decisions, but I am always open and ready to listen. I know of no prominent commentators who preach immutable truth on the topic, and, the voices I listen to and respect the most are those whose message comes by way of insightful suggestion. Moreover, I am not at all put off if some even go so far as to explain why. Yes, I do believe that there are wine-and-food matches that most of the people will like most of the time. And if you recommend that I try a food and wine combination that you found enjoyable, I will more often than not give that advice a try—unless, of course, you suggest a heavy, full-bodied, tannic Syrah with my oysters on the half shell.

I think we can all agree that there is a measure of “acquired taste” when it comes to appreciating fine wine, art, great music, good food and the like, and the journey of discovery that I began long ago goes on to this day. I may not take it on faith when someone claims that a precipitous cliff lies ahead, but I will not rush headlong into the abyss just to prove my individuality. I may not always agree with those who I meet on the way, but I am thankful for those writers, retailers, sommeliers and neighbors next door who are willing to share what has worked for them.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Alcohol Will Make You Drunk

Tue, 09 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Three decades and seven years ago, when Connoisseurs’ Guide was in its infancy, we ventured up to the Napa Valley to interview Louis Martini. He informed us that the problem with wine was that it contained alcohol.

Well, yes, we countered, and thought to ourselves but did not say, tell us something we don’t know. But, happily we kept that smartass comment to ourselves and Mr. Martini proceeded to explain that he felt constrained by the alcohol because he could not drink all the wine he wanted to drink. And with that comment, the light went on. Connoisseurs’ Guide may have started with the intent to make people more aware of California wine, but we also had somehow wandered into the minefield of moderation and we unwittingly had become part of the forces of moderation.

Today, we are still fighting the same battles over how much wine is enough and how much is too much. The Government helps us, of course, by passing drunk-driving laws with measurable standards, and, in its enforcement of those standards, we learn how much is allowed and how much is intolerable. Never mind that the limits have changed over time and that they are different from place to place. The United States seem to like blood alcohol levels of 0.08% as a national standard. In other parts of the world, the standard is 0.05%.

The resulting decreases in public drunkenness and drunk-driving accidents are certainly positives, and we would not want to eliminate the laws that have brought about those societal changes. Still, there is much about blood alcohol levels that remains somewhat mystical. In Australia, for example, bottles of wine have a statement on the back that tells the average-sized person how much he or she can drink of a given wine. No consideration is given to the effects of drinking with food as opposed to drinking with an empty stomach. And no consideration is given to the known ability of the body to adjust itself to varying drinking habits.

An article in the San Francisco Chronicle this past Sunday does more to shed light on this issue than all the previous polemics and theories to date. That it is written by a serious, thoughtful doctor, and a doctor who is a teacher of other doctors explains in large measure why it is such a useful read. And that it was written by Dr. Michael Apstein, one of the most pleasant, honest and gentle souls who has ever put pen to people in winewriting further explains why I now suggest that you follow the link below to his comments.

Click on this link if interested in the topic: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/08/07/FDVT1KJ5BP.DTL

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
The Joke’s On Us—Unless We Fight Back

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If we blindly accept that we must pick our grapes by the phases of the moon, the joke’s on us. If we blindly accept that the only true expression of wine is vineyard-specific, the joke’s on us.

If we buy wine by numbers and not by taste, the joke’s on us for being foolish. But, if we accept that no symbolic rating system has any validity, especially those that are accompanied by thoughtful, rigorously researched tasting notes, and listen only to those who would sell us wine they own, the joke is truly on us for subscribing not to knowledge-based thinking but to a new brand of wine religion.

If we allow words like authenticity, typicity, terroiricity and organicity to replace our own palates and our own ability to taste, to read, to think, to comprehend ideas and to form conclusions based on any and all inputs that make sense to us, the joke’s on us.

Yet, folks, that is what the true believers would have us do. They would have us not compare wines against each other. They would have us believe that only the winemakers and the retailers know what is good for us. They attempt to shame us for listening to voices other than their own. They pretend that wine is not a product offered to the world by a business—often a multimillion dollar business owned and operated, in large measure, by rich corporations and rich people.

They want us to believe that the fat cats have got it right and the educated little people have got it wrong. They want us to believe exactly what they believe and to sign petitions that say so. They are creating a new religion, and you are either a follower or you are a heretic.

If you think I exaggerate, read the “oath of allegiance” that one must sign in order to join the cult of true believers.

I hereby distinctly and emphatically declare my allegiance to the revolution.

It matters not that this oath of allegiance is supposedly part of self-proclaimed movement to do away with wine scores. When you read the so-called “Manifesto” to which you are asked to swear distinct and emphatic allegiance, you are asked to endorse far more than the idea that wine scores are inimical to wine evaluation. You are swearing allegiance also to the worship of terroir as the only true measure of wine, and you are forever forswearing the notion that anyone other than the folks who own the wine can tell you anything significant about wine quality.

Here is the language that tells you not to read, not to listen, not to believe in the notion of wine criticism, as if wine criticism were somehow different from automobile criticism or restaurant criticism or movie criticism.

If we rely on the biased palates of a select few – and no palate can ever be unbiased, as the process of tasting is supremely personal – to tell us what is good, great, and perfect, then haven’t we sacrificed our own personal understanding of the wine, and as such, what would be the point of drinking it?

“What would be the point of drinking it?” Did someone really write that? It is like asking what would be the point of buying a BMW if Car and Driver recommended it? There are some 150 models of cars within the competitive price range of a basic BMW 3-series. Are we now supposed to drive everyone one of them ourselves before deciding? Or is the basic message of the Manifesto that we should buy the first one that drives well because each is different and thus not subject to comparison?

Well, I have figured out the underlying message here. It is this. If we allow folks to tell us how to think, how to lead our lives, to whom to listen and not listen, to follow only their systems of understanding and not the ones that make sense to us, then the joke is truly on us. Because bottom line, those folks are just trying to sell us their wine without having us ask questions and without listening to anyone but them.

Friday Fishwrap
The Stupidest Debate in Wine Country—The 100-Point System

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

They are at it again. The folks who would tell us how to run our lives. They want us all to abandon wine ratings because they have outlived their usefulness—or, in the case of one winery—because they got crappy scores for their crappy wines.

Well, folks, just ask these purveyors of doom what it is they really want and you will get a blank stare and some mumbo-jumbo about words instead of numbers. I will have a lot more to say about this state of affairs in the coming weeks if this stupid, monotonous debate does not subside and die of its own weight.

But, here is the bottom line. Rating systems for critical reviews of similar, competing products have existed for a very long time now and they are not going away, are not out of date, are not of little or no use to those who read them. All it takes are a few well-thought out sentences in association with the rating system for the meaning of the rating to be incredibly clear to everyone—even those whose oxen are being gored.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Conversion on the Road to Damascus?

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I too often get the feeling that the first rule of wine blogging is to challenge and dismiss any notion of "rules", and the idea that there actually might be relevant guidelines to "food and wine pairing" is regularly a point of attack. We are told that more people drink wine without food than with it and numbed into lethargy by a monotonous drone of "drink what you want, you know your tastes better than anyone else." Ultimately, I cannot argue with that simple statement, but, as I have written more than once, a few simple principles - let's not call them "laws" - hold true for most of the people most of the time, and I for one still find the great food and wine match to be a pleasure that is considerably more than a sum of its parts.

Those thoughts visit me again as I sit with my morning coffee and spy in today's blogging headlines one titled How I Fell Back In Love With Food-And-Wine Pairing (And Why The "Drink Whatever You Want" Mantra Might Be Wrong). It seems that Joe Roberts, aka 1 Wine Dude, has rejoined the ranks of those who think that there just might be something to a few rough food and wine guidelines after all.

Now, I do not think that the " ‘drink whatever you want' mantra" is wrong, but I do believe that with time and experience most people will find certain combinations pleasant and others quite the opposite most of the time. I would not point a finger and sneer at someone who wants to wash down braised lamb shanks with Chablis or a delicate Dover sole recipe with a young Cabernet, but I am willing to bet that most folks would not leave the table in a particularly good mood.

Yes, Joe, a reasonable road map will make the journey more pleasant and can avoid some nasty bumps in the road. Moreover, getting things "right" can make something pleasant downright delicious and memorable, and I do get tired of being called an irrelevant, self-appointed gate-keeping elitist for simply pointing it out.

Joe wraps up his epiphanal rant by saying "Most of us have probably shed the "it's gotta be perfect" food-and-wine pairing attitude a long time ago, but please don't give me the "you can drink whatever you want with anything all the time" mantra - because it's bullsh*t. Don't bother with a laundry list of food-and-wine pairing rules, but don't act like there are no guidelines anymore, because wine geeks are smart people, and more than totally capable of learning and mastering rough guidelines from the pros - ones that have been proven to work in professional settings for many years."

I could not agree more.

Tuesday Tributes
The “Euro-palate”, “California Apologists” and the “Anti-flavor Elite”

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I have always thought that one of the great joys to be found in fine wine is its amazing diversity of character and its ability to involve on so many levels. I have similarly always been baffled by the seeming need of so many to proclaim one style or another as being inherently right or wrong and to create derisive, myopic, value-laden little titles by which to dismiss those who do not see the truth in their views. Whatever the reasons, the clash of values and visions as to what good wine should be seems to have reached a crescendo of late.

I suppose, however, that I am less bothered by those who clearly draw lines in the sand and make their positions clear than by those who take on a catholic mantle and claim no allegiance to one style or another, but then immediately go on the attack. I am not at all annoyed that everyone has an opinion, it is that too many has the "right" one, and they just cannot wait to tell you that yours is wrong.

More and more, it seems, that accolades for one wine or style comes complete with nasty little asides that diminish another. It is not enough that a wine is fresh and nuanced, it must be praised for what it is not...too ripe, overly oaked or, god forbid, above 14% alcohol! While rich and fruity are traits to be applauded, I do not need to be told in the same breath what the wine in not.

When I read reports and wine commentary, I look for descriptions of what a wine is rather than what it is not, and I have grown increasingly weary and annoyed with those that take a contrary tack. Despite the hollow claims of a good many writers that they are merely articulating what they do and do not like, that they subscribe to no hard-and-fast agenda, many have become downright monotonous in their unsubtle messages.

Most often, it seems, Californian wines are those in the critical crosshairs, and, for many, the best Californian wines are those that do not taste Californian! Other than Robert Parker's defensive and somewhat notorious attack on the "anti-flavor elite", the brunt of naysaying has focused on California and its so-called "apologists", and, if the criticism is clear and direct, that wines of high-extract and richness are not to someone's taste, I will simply beg to differ and accept that beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. If, however, damning by faint praise is the game, that pointing out a few preferred bottlings while relegating the rest to being ill-conceived, poorly made and utterly unworthwhile, then I do get annoyed and feel the need to speak out.

The San Francisco Chronicle recently suggested that it was time to abandon at least one of the tidy and misleading titles that introduce today's posting, but in doing so it employed another. It is time, I think, to abandon them all and the narrow thinking that they perpetuate. It is time to get back to the business of enjoying wine.

Thursday Thorns
Throw Off The Chains Of Oppression! Wine Lovers Of The World Unite!

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There are thorns aplenty in the world of wine writing of late, so many, in fact, that it is harder and harder to read the news today (oh boy) without injury. Just when I pick one prickly barb from my posterior another seems to take its place, and a fascinating and rather disturbing bit of writing showed up in my electronic mail box today that makes sitting down more painful yet.

It was entitled "Wine Score Revolution Gains Momentum" sent from a winery that bills itself as "a guardian of Red Mountain Viticultural Area...that protects the terroir in tradition chronicled by principles the old world's great estates sanctified." Oh, Hosemaster, where are you now that we need you.

The gist of the message was to invite me to join other "leaders of the wine world" and embrace the Wine Score Revolution by signing a Manifesto meant to "bring together like-minded souls who agree that scores should not be used to buy or sell wine." The intended purpose, as they state is "to create transparency among buyers and sellers and to encourage people to find wines based on writings and by word of mouth. The power of scores is limiting the discovery of numerous grower wines, encouraging formula wines, and even influencing the creation of brand icons and inflated pricing scenarios." Oh my, I now wonder if wine scores are the reason that the US of A is about to default on its debt.

Now, I really do not mean to be disrespectful, but in these politically charged times, I have grown weary of those who would save me.

The debate about scoring wines is nothing new and, in the oh-so-populist realm of the internet, the topic has pretty much been beaten to death, or so I thought. I am reminded of a fine piece of blogging from Josh Wade on NectarWineBlog.com some time back that did a nice job of discussing the issue. "You Don't Score Wine? You're Full of Crap" was, I recall, the title. It is worth a read, and there are many other insightful thinkers that have checked in on the topic. We have as well.

Scoring, whether by 100 points, twenty points, multiple stars, bicchieri or chopsticks is no more than a summary way in which to say that someone likes one wine more than another. While we agree without reservation with those who argue that it is not by itself of singular importance, a "score" can serve as a useful shorthand to many would-be wine buyers, especially when accompanied by writing that effectively describes the wine in a way that is valid and meaningful to most people. That is, after all, the job of a professional wine writer.

Scores may be the target, but the message that was apparently born of an epiphany after trying to sell the family's wines to a disagreeable chef in New York clearly seems to be that any kind of a comparative rating system is fatally flawed and destined to undermine the winemaker's art. The argument goes that you can no more compare wines than you can compare works of art. I hold that it is a part of human nature to do just that, however, to compare. This tastes good and that does not; this is attractive and that is ugly. Pictures of Dogs Playing Poker as good as a Marc Chagall print? Not in my world.

Should we not compare and rate restaurants? I rely on Zagat, and have come to trust Michael Bauer's reviews in the San Francisco Chronicle. Do I consider hotel reviews before booking, you bet, and, while not the sole source for a choice, I pay attention to movie reviews and Consumer's Report ratings when it comes to washing machines, cars and big-screen TVs. In none of these instances is the "score" that which wholly drives my decision, but it does get my attention and narrows my likely choices in a way that precludes, for example, the need to read every last word of commentary about every restaurant in town before deciding just where to have dinner. Yeah, I confess that I often find scores, numbers and symbols useful.

As much as I disagree with the notion that ratings and scores are without value, however, I am far more troubled by the claims that because of them, legions of winemakers have put aside their desire to make origin-specific wines and that authenticity, historical style and expression of terroir are in dire jeopardy. It seems to me that I hear more talk about the sanctity of terroir and its considerable ranks of devoted defenders now than I have in the decades that I have been writing about wine. They are far from silent. I am especially impressed by the passionate voices celebrating new viticultural areas with no past or historical perspective at all!

Now, it seems that the folks behind the "movement" by their own admission love wine critics and writers, and that their "sole objective is to eliminate wine scores and does not intend to undermine the importance of wine writers". Amen. They plead that wine critics are allowed "to practice their craft and let their words speak for themselves." Hey, that is what we think too. It is what we do. Our lives and work would be far easier if all we had to do was dole out scores and not spend countless hours searching for words that address just what the wine is and is not. There is, of course, a vocal cadre of critics that decry tasting notes as useless at best. No, you just cannot please everyone.

In the end, the issue is not scores but clear and informed commentary be it by writers or retailers or sommeliers. If it does not meet the need, consumers will turn elsewhere for advice. If scores matter to someone that is fine, but, if real interest in wine slowly takes hold, they will start asking questions and numbers will not be enough. The buyer that is content to buy by scores alone is not likely hunting for terroir, minimalist winemaking and "authenticity", and the notion that eliminating scores will somehow bring him into the fold seems rather a long reach to me. Ratings make life easy for those who want nothing more, and the world is filled with good information for those that do.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Make Mine Riesling

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There are more than few folks in the wine business that would argue that Riesling is the greatest white wine grape of them all, and, on any given day, I just might agree. It can be delicate and yet uncannily complex at the same time, and its ability to balance sugar and acidity is unrivaled. It succeeds equally well in dry, slightly sweet and extremely sweet versions, and, but for those sporting extreme residual sugars, the wines created from it are remarkably easy to match up with food.

I never ceased to be surprised at the raised eyebrows and skeptical looks I get when, in my lectures at culinary school, I talk of the remarkable food-friendly nature of those of moderate sweetness and at the persistent belief by even those who are food and wine savvy that sugar in wine is somehow a bad thing. Perhaps it is because we all started out on wines that play to sweetness and then graduated to dry wines. There is a need, I think, to bolster our sense of learned sophistication by belittling what we enjoyed as rank beginners. Well folks, there is a world of enjoyment waiting for those willing to rethink such silly notions.

One of the simple rules of successful wine and food pairing for me has always been that if there is palpable sweetness on the plate, then it is a good idea that the accompanying wine has a touch more. No, it is not a hard and fast rule, and "taste" is hardly a universal absolute, but too often dry wines turn bitter and harsh when teamed up with sweeter dishes. I mean, how many people prefer Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and the like as a dessert-course companion?

The thing to remember, however, is that there a good many entrees that show a sweeter side as well. That piece of sea bass buried beneath some sort of tropical fruit salsa, fresh cracked crab and what seems to be half the cuisine of Southeast Asia are all foods that can bring out a stiffer, sometimes shrieky side of very dry wines. A little balancing sweetness in the glass can be very welcome, and, for my money, Riesling does the trick at the table as well as any grape that I know.

Not surprisingly, we have been tasting our way through a bevy of new Rieslings here at CGCW, and our kitchen counters are filled with open bottles of the same. I have not, therefore, been cooking a lot of tomatoey pastas, and hearty braised meats have been put on hold. Chinese, Thai and Indian flavors have been the thing at Chez Eliot of late, and, if there has not been an especially revelatory moment of discovery at dinner, there has been enormous satisfaction in the near-nightly reminders of just how wonderfully well slightly sweet Riesling works in washing down slightly sweet foods.

Tuesday Tributes
Fermentation Finishes First: The Voters Get It Right!

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 00:01:00 -0700

By Steve Eliot

A quick check on the wine blogosphere finds the week beginning with plenty of chatter about the just-announced winners of the 2011 Wine Blog Awards, and, as might be expected, the tone of commentary ranges from congratulatory patting-on-the-back to second-guessing, from smiles and raised eyebrows to downright dissension. We, of course, feel compelled to add our own two-cents to the discussion.

We were not a contender at the 4th annual North American Wine Bloggers Conference in Charlottesville. The CGCW blog is still in its infancy and too new for consideration, there are no hurt feelings or vanity votes here, and the extent to which we may or may not agree with results is irrelevant. Our thoughts, this morning, are not so much concerned with who won and who did not, but rather with the remarkable growth and maturity of wine blogging as a whole.

Yes, many complain that there is far too much electronic bleating of Internet sheep, and, even if we agree that worthwhile insights might have at times been likened to needles in a haystack, there are more than a few serious voices and provocative ideas to be found these days from those whose passion drives them to blog about wine. There has been much hand-wringing about what blogging has meant and will mean to the world of wine journalism. Will it survive? Will wine bloggers tire as daily then weekly then even monthly writing becomes a grind? What kind of rewards might drive professional involvement...and is professional involvement all that important? Good questions all and ones that inspire no small measure of crystal-ball speculation, but one thing is certain: the world of wine writing has been indelibly changed.

The latest round of Blogger Awards very much testifies to that fact, and, if the winners deserve a tip of the hat, so too does the host of very good writers and sites that just missed in their reach for the ring. This year's top honors as Best Overall Wine Blog goes to Tom Wark's Fermentation, http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/, and we could not agree more. Mr. Wark has been called the godfather of wine blogging, the one who started it all, but his successes are not about being first, they are about thoughtful relevance, solid reporting and advocacy for common sense. In the aftermath of his award, he muses in this morning's web entry about the meanings and measures of success and comes the conclusion that success is ultimately tied and dependant on "how other people react to what you are doing."

Yes, Tom, we agree, and this Tuesday we feel the need to react by adding our voices to the many who feel that the voters got this one right.

SPECIAL REPORT
Checking In From Nova Scotia

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The whole idea of traveling up to Canada's Maritime Provinces was to get away from it all for a week or so And I suppose I have no complaints. Tomorrow, we travel out to fishing villages, galleries and a whale watching expedition, But tonight, having arrived without lunch and on a delayed flight, we settled for an early dinner. With the help of Yelp, we identified a couple of places and took the one that had parking available. It was a pleasant restaurant called The Five Fishermen.

Our first wine, a 2010 Villa Maria Private Reserve Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand, was as expected, a totally reliable, likeable accompaniment to a platter of local oysters on the half shell. But, as luck would have it, the bottle ran out and there I was, the only one at the table in need of a refill. A quick glance at the wine list uncovered what I had missed the first time through--two pages of local wines, many of which were being served by the glass. I asked our waiter who in the house had the best knowledge of the list, and, lo and behold, he upped and fetched a real sommelier. This was no kid who was learning on the job. Avery Gavel was an experienced pro who would have been right at home in any restaurant anywhere. He knew each of the wines, could discuss fermentation techniques and wine styles for each wine, and even before I had had a chance to taste his selections of local efforts, I already had an education. That is what a good sommelier can do, but it takes time and experience to get to that point.

He chose three whites, including an unoaked Chardonnay, a rarity in this very cool clime, a proprietary winery blend and a wine that surprised the heck out of me. It was made by a winery named L'Acadie from a grape of the same name and was fragrant, vinous, dry and smooth. And while it might not have been a great choice for briny, unadorned, fresh-shucked oysters, it was perfect with a seafood salad with shrimp, scallops and maple-smoked salmon.

Now, I know that few of you are likely to find yourself in Nova Scotia or environs this summer, or any summer, but surely, there are some ones out there who, like me, are going to make a pilgrimage up this way to taste fresh fish and shellfish pulled from very cold waters. And if and when you do, L'Acadie is a winery to remember and L'Acadie is also a grape to remember. Their top bottling is called Star and it will be a pleasant surprise.

Friday Fishwrap
Pay Attention: I Have The Antidote To One-Hundred Dollar Wine

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It's the middle of summer. Time to relax. Just drink wine because you like it. No need to spend a hundred dollars for the privilege. I got the antidote to expensive wine right here.

This weekend, do yourself and your wallet a favor and buy a wine that you can enjoy without having to analyze the hell out of it. Sure, it may not be complex, layered, sophisticated, refined, but if you pick up one of wines below, identified in our blind tastings as a Best Buy among the hundreds and hundreds of wine we taste, you can sit back on your easy chair or your patio and enjoy wine the best way possible-for sheer joy of it. Here then, my value picks for the weekend ahead.

The fragrant PALI Huntington Santa Barbara County 2009 ($19.00) and its companion bottling, the racy PALI Riviera Sonoma Coast 2009 ($19.00) are hard to beat at the price point. The juicy, well-ripened BRIDLEWOOD Monterey 2008 ($20.00) and the supple, slightly berry-like SEBASTIANI Sonoma Coast 2009 ($18.00) similarly prove that good Pinot can be found for $20.00 or less. It hard to find wines of the quality offered by this quartet without paying considerably more.

Viognier may not have lived up to expectations in every corner of the California, but there are very good California Viogniers to be had, and these wines, with their aromatic fruit offered in dry, balanced styles make excellent summertime drinking. The rich, ripe and eminently satisfying EBERLE Mill Road Vineyard 2009 ($21.00) proves the point, and its 91-point score makes it one of the bargains of this or any week. Also, you might keep an eye out as well for the very lively ZACA MESA Santa Ynez Valley 2009 ($20.00) and the brisk, eminently fruity * CURTIS Heritage Blanc Santa Barbara County 2009 ($18.00).

It may be true that Zinfandel's ripeness and prices have both been on the increase over the last several years, but our recent Connoisseurs' Guide tastings have found an encouraging number of first-rate bottlings that are both affordable and long on the juicy fruit that marks the varietal at its best. Although the 95-point RAVENSWOOD Teldeschi Dry Creek Valley 2008 ($35.00) admittedly comes at a premium, it is an altogether classic Zinfandel of enormous depth, complexity and attentive winemaking. It is one that you can enjoy now or put away for later. Zin does not get any better than this, and greatness in any wine usually costs a lot more.

Among lower-priced Zinfandels, you cannot go wrong with the sturdy EASTON Amador County 2009 ($16.00), the gutsy, well-ripened PROJECT PASO Old Vine Paso Robles 2009 ($14.00) and the solid, tannin-firmed ARTEZIN Mendocino County 2009 ($18.00). And, at the "pour it for the gang" end of the scale, both the modestly priced ROSENBLUM Vintner's Cuvée XXXIII California ($12.00) and the CLINE California 2009 ($12.00) win easy Best Buy votes as friendly partners to red-sauced pastas and barbecues.

My list of Chardonnays for the weekend is topped by the rounded, well-composed 90-point CHAMISAL Edna Valley 2008 ($24.00), a wine of depth and accessibility with enough buoyant acidity to be at home with all manner of chicken or seafoods hot off the Weber. The bright and lively SEBASTIANI Sonoma County 2009 ($13.00) is simply a remarkable wine at the price, and the engaging, thoroughly enjoyable RODNEY STRONG Chalk Hill Sonoma County 2009 ($20.00) is a thoroughly satisfying effort that will bring smiles to both your palate and your wallet.

Thursday Thorns
The New York Times Throws California Sauvignon Blanc Under The Bus

Thu, 21 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“There you go again”. That famous phrase from Presidential debates is back. The NYT has once again attacked California wine. This time its target is Sauvignon Blanc.

Sauvignon Blanc is, of course, an easy target. A Wine Spectator writer once suggested that the variety should be abandoned worldwide. Yet, Sauvignon Blanc is one of the more food-friendly wines to be had, and, we here at Connoisseurs’ Guide agree. When well-made, it has enough character to stand up to moderately rich foods, but it is rarely so heavy as to demand boldly flavored dishes. It takes less precision in pairing than Chardonnay and it has more to offer in the way of interest than the legion of refreshing, but generally wispy, whites from distant lands that have lately been gaining a critical following.

It is rarely a wine of breath-taking complexity and excitement, even if a few such examples can occasionally be found here and there, but it almost always affords an eminently easy-to-drink glass. Shellfish, sundry white-fleshed fishes and lighter poultry all seem to find a comfortable fit. It is, in short, a wine that affords pleasure without making much in the way of demands. Certainly, there is an ocean of fairly boring stuff to be had from most of the world’s so very many Sauvignon Blanc vineyards, but the good ones remain high on our list of go-to white wines when we want something pleasant to wash down lighter meals.

California does well with Sauvignon Blanc, yet I have also long enjoyed the brisk and bracing bottlings of France’s Sancerre and Pouilly-Fume districts, and the better vibrantly grassy versions of New Zealand are similarly among my favorites. Those of California have always been tougher to categorize as being of one style or another, but given that the home-grown variety comes from a range of extraordinarily diverse sites ranging from Santa Barbara to Mendocino to the Sierra Foothills and all points between, I suppose that comes as no surprise. I do, however, find some amusement in the New York Times article today that takes a dim view of California Sauvignon Blanc for that very reason.

A stepchild that lacks identity is the knock this time out…at least, that’s how the article starts out. I would not disagree that a wide variation of style is to be had hereabouts, but given that there are California Sauvignon Blancs made for areas as cold as the Loire, as temperate as Bordeaux, as warm as the southern Rhône and as hot as Calabria, I am not surprised. If lacking a single, predictable style is a failing, then so be it. It is, however, a criticism that has gotten fairly monotonous; first Syrah, then Pinot Noir, now Sauvignon Blanc.

The NYT article, though, takes a turn away from its seeming introductory premise, and, in the end concludes that the inherent problem with California Sauvignon Blanc is that there simply are not many good ones to be had and that cynical winemaking is the fault. While the article’s author begins by commenting that a few years back California was doing a pretty good job, he quickly turns to the incredibly tired and boring refrains of too ripe, too oaky and overly manipulated. And we are left with a closing comment that “it’s hard to expect consumers to take a wine seriously if the producer itself does not”.

It is all silly stuff and nonsense, I think. Nothing has changed. California Sauvignon Blanc is the same as it always has been. If you liked it then, you will like it now.

Mr. Asimov and his tasters, who admittedly found some bottles they liked, thought their tasting of twenty local examples – and there were some very good names in the bunch -- was marked by a “distinct absence of excitement”. Well, beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder, but the leap from likeable and unexciting to a stepchild so unloved by its makers that they no longer take it seriously and to a clear implication that Sauvignon Blanc is a yet another varietal in trouble in California has an all-too-familiar East Coast ring. There they go again, indeed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/20/dining/reviews/sauvignon-blanc-from-northern-california-wine-review.html?_r=1&ref=dining

Tuesday Tributes
Bad Wine Gives You A Bellyache

Tue, 19 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Conversely, if a wine does not give you a bellyache, it must not be bad.

It is now well over three decades ago that this little bit of wisdom was imparted at one of our tastings. And the man doing the imparting was Alfred Baxter, founder of Veedercrest, one of the pioneers of the small winery movement of the early seventies. Mr. Baxter was explaining why Connoisseurs' Guide should not give a negative review to a wine of less than stellar character. He had a point, of course. This wine was someone's creation-and probably a proud creation. Why should it get slammed for not being La Tache or Latour or even Georges de Latour Private Reserve?

Why indeed? I have always thought that the best answer to Mr. Baxter, who was clearly having a spot of fun at the expense of a couple of fledgling critics who had just stepped out of the shadows and into print, would have been, "Because somebody has to do it". Somebody has to tell the truth about wine as he or she sees it. It is the essence of criticism, and it is the raison d'etre of Connoisseurs' Guide.

Recently, two of the best writers I know, Alder Yarrow who writes the blog, Vinography, and Tom Wark, who writes the blog, Fermentation, have commented on ethics in the wine biz and the search for truth. Mr. Yarrow's blog of yesterday examined a bit of a spitting contest that is being waged back east between a blogger and a writer of the Wall Street Journal. The Journal writer stands accused of saying nice things about a wine made by a close personal friend. To the blogger, a certain Dr. Vino, that behavior was inappropriate. Mr. Yarrow, in his blog, chose to chide them both. On the one hand, Lettie Teague of the Journal has certainly been less than transparent about her friendship with the winemaker. On the other, Dr. Vino had been extremely judgmental.

Mr. Wark, and is there a nicer man in all of the wine biz with a name that sounds like something out of Star Trek, chose to say that the problem is not with the critics but with some winery public relations efforts. He was referring directly to some of the claims made by proponents of biodynamic winemaking. Whether those folks are right or wrong is less the issue for Mr. Wark than the fact that they are so convinced of their own wisdom that they wind up insulting those who do not follow their practices.

All of which brings me back to Al Baxter. Mr. Baxter's words have stayed with me across the three-plus decades of Connoisseurs' Guide. I choose not to follow them to the letter because the Guide was started for the express purpose of separating the wheat from the chaff in California winemaking. Yet, over the years, Connoisseurs' Guide, and lots of other writers who follow rigorous tasting methodologies and transparent information policies, operate with one part of our brain locked into the search for truth while another equally important part is reminding us that the wine is more important than we are.

That is the message that caused Dr. Vino to go off on Lettie Teague of the Journal and Tom Wark to label unsubstantiated claims of moral and vinous superiority emanating from a few overly zealous followers of biodynamic farming practices as fraud. It may not be the wine that gives us the bellyache. Sometimes it is the inflated rhetoric.

Monday Manifestos
Paul Ryan and I Drink Expensive Wine—Just Not Together

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I once sat at a table with a man who ordered a bottle of Cheval Blanc 1989. He paid for it; not me, but you can bet I drank my share.

Now, whether this fine fellow was trying to impress me or was just paying me back for the bottles of 1970 Beaulieu and Mayacamas I brought to dinner with him at the fabulous Gary Danko restaurant here in San Francisco is of no matter to me. I taste people wines blind and I don’t much care one way or the other how nice the makers are. I once give the dreaded down-turned glass, together with a score of 75 points, to a Chardonnay made by the father of my god son. Truth is truth, and a bottle of wine won’t change that—especially when it is oxidized before its time.

All of which brings me to the modest kerfuffle generated when Representative Paul Ryan (yes, that Paul Ryan of the famous budget proposal) was treated to two bottles of $350 Burgundy at a toney dinner in Washington, D. C. Apparently another diner, of the opposing political persuasion, spotted this “bad behavior” on Mr. Ryan’s part and called him out on it. Now, whether I have a bone to pick with Mr. Ryan over his budget (I do) is not the issue here. People go to dinner in fancy restaurants. They often go to those dinners for business reasons. My business is wine. His is politics. We go with folks who want our ears. Dinners at Gary Danko will at least get my attention for a few hours. It cannot buy my vote at the tasting table the next day, and there is zero likelihood that Mr. Ryan was about to change his spots for the single glass of wine he reportedly enjoyed.

But there is another side to this story, and it is far more interesting to me personally. I refer to the excellent analysis by Mike Steinberger of Slate Magazine. You can find the whole article at http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2011/07/12/so_what_if_paul_ryan_drank_a_350_bottle_of_wine_.html .

Here in part is what Mr. Steinberger has so excellently observed. I quote the parts that made me laugh out loud.

“Ryan and his dinner companions knocked back two bottles of the 2004 Jayer-Gilles Echézeaux du Dessus, a grand cru red Burgundy. At $350 a pop, it is the fourth-costliest wine on the list at Bistro Bis, the Capitol Hill restaurant where the three men ate. One of the guests, a hedge fund manager, reportedly ordered the wine, which makes sense: As any Manhattan sommelier will tell you, the priciest wines on a list are catnip for master of the universe types.

What we have here is a textbook case of a table with more money than wine sense. Jayer-Gilles is a middling producer, and the 2004 vintage for red Burgundies has turned out to be a major bust: Many of the wines have a pronounced and very unappealing vegetal note. Ryan and his friends could have saved themselves $400 and a lot of grief by going instead with the 2005 Joseph Voillot Volnay Champans, a much better wine from a great vintage that is on the Bistro Bis list for $150 a bottle. The hedge fund guy may be an ace investor, but next time, he should leave the wine to someone else.”

Nuff said.

Friday Fishwrap
Hitting the Tannin Wall—And Fighting Back

Fri, 15 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Oftimes, when I am tasting Pinot Noir, I get seduced by its velvety texture and lush, layered fruit, and I forget that other varieties are not so friendly in their youth.

But this week, Connoisseurs’ Guide has been working its way through the best of the Cabernet Sauvignons. We have been retasting the top wines, a process we always do before rewarding any wine with a score of 90 and above, and, equally, before panning wines that we find wanting. And the thing that strikes us is that these tastings are far more fatiguing than tasting Pinot Noir. These are wines that are meant for the cellar. They are babies and have not begun to show their potential for the complex, supple beauty of the type that only comes with cellar aging.

A few years ago, maybe a decade at that, some wineries decided that tannin and structure were not good things, and they opted for very ripe wines, high in glycerin, low in acidity and luscious for drinking without long cellaring. And for a few years at least, this style grabbed headlines and was somewhat widely imitated. The wines were not bad, mind you, and they still had the ability to age a bit because Cabernet Sauvignon has the innate ability to hang on even when its style is opened up. Some writers, among them my buddy Dan Berger, dubbed them “parodies of themselves”, and he was not far wrong for the worst offenders.

Whether friend Berger exaggerated or not, the truth is that Cabernet Sauvignon was then and is today a fairly fierce variety in its youth. A winery can up the ripeness, can try to avoid harsh tannins through a variety of winemaking moves and can limit the underlying acidity of the wine, but no matter what they do, Cabernet is Cabernet. The assertion that the very ripe versions of the variety of the type that rose to prominence in the 1990s and stayed in frame until the mid-2000s would not hold up under cellaring are being disproved by a variety of vertical tastings that we and other writers are now undertaking. Still, overripe, or even very highly ripened, wines are just that, and for every wine that ages handsomely there is one that is coming up a bit short.

Well, if are you like us, and are willing to put a few wines by so that they can achieve the brilliance that is only gained with maturity of ten or fifteen years of patience, then you will be happy to know that the wall of tannin that can be young Cabernet Sauvignon is back—and it is back in full force. The makers of the grape, the folks who understand that this is a variety whose real value lies not in what it might show at four years but what it can show at twelve or twenty, have fought back, and their wines are now again in charge of our tastings. If a little palate fatigue, or taking a break in the middle of tasting, is the price for this return to the search for true Cabernet grandeur, then it is a small price to pay. Bring it on. We are Cabernet addicts again.

Thursday Thorns
Do You Think You Ought To Drink Less

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have a healthy regard for the medical profession. Almost every doctor I know is a wine drinker, and that makes them OK with me. So, when I was asked recently, “Do you think you ought to drink less?”, I listened.

Of course, I also answered in the negative to such a silly question. But it set me to thinking. There I was, lying in a hospital bad, having been diagnosed with pneumonia, and someone who is updating my charts asks how much I drink and do I think I should drink less.

Now, if I had told this person that I was consuming a half bottle a day, I could possibly have understood why the second question followed the first in rapid order. But my answer to question number one was “five drinks a week”. OK, maybe I was kidding. Maybe I had a bad feeling about what was coming next. But, if a response of “five drinks a week” triggers the question “do you think you need to drink less?”, then I certainly chose the right dodge.

Wine in moderation, meaning up to two glasses a day, is good for many of the things that ail us or might ail us. I do not often get to that level, but I certainly do on occasion. There are days, and Monday was a good example, when tasting through a batch of heavy reds leaves me wanting a glass of orange juice or a big jug of seltzer water with lemon. The last thing I want to put into my mouth is another glass of wine.

I belong to a rather large medical organization, and much of the early research about wine and health was conducted by one of its cardiologists. Another of its cardiologist is the head of the Medical Friends of Wine. A few years ago, I spent some time in the care of an internal medicine doc who owns a vineyard. I had to change optometrists at this large organization because the guy I was seeing spent all his time quizzing me about what to drink. And then he got the prescription wrong. I now have a very nice young woman eye doctor, and she does not quiz me about my job. I think my file must have big tag on the front that reads, “This guy knows something about wine”. I don’t mind. Let the docs want to pay a little extra attention.

I’m down with all of that. I just don’t understand why so many of the docs love wine while someone else is asking me if I would like to cut back from five glasses of wine per week.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Thorns
Let’s Kill The AVA System Now

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I joke, of course. The AVA system may not be perfect. In fact, it is far from it. But just like capitalism and democracy, it is the best thing we have at the moment and we have nothing better with which to replace it.

I do worry about the AVA system. Purists like me think that large AVAs purporting to be smaller places are not especially meaningful. And it distresses me, when I think that much of the Napa Valley is divided up by political boundaries rather than by definable land masses and microclimates. There is a distinct difference between the Cabernets of East Rutherford and those of West Rutherford, yet we have no West Rutherford AVA—only Rutherford itself from east to west. So, yes, the AVA system is not exactly perfect.

On the other side of the fence are those who think all California wine tastes alike anyhow and AVAs simply get in the way of enjoyment. To listen to them, the only consideration that ever went into AVA formation was marketing power. There is a certain amount of truth in that assertion, but even for Rutherford, it belies the fact that Rutherford, east or west, is still significantly different from Howell Mountain or Carneros or Coombsville.

That’s why it just stuns me that our morning newspaper seems to think that AVAs are part of the problem here in California. If we have a problem, and arguably we might, it is that we have grown so fast, made so many changes in plantings, technique and technology over the past forty years that we might now be better off taking a deep breath and having a look around before plunging ahead into the next period of growth and change. The slow economy may seem to be allowing such a period of introspection, but the truth is that all we have seen so far are wineries struggling to keep their heads above water and wineries who have not had to struggle and so are keeping on with keeping on.

That’s sort of the American way anyhow. Damn the torpedos. Full speed ahead. The entrepreneurial spirit is not given to introspection. It is not built on self-examination. We do things and ask questions later. That’s how Connoisseurs’ Guide got its start. That’s how thousands of small, family-owned wineries got their starts. And, we are not going to change that system any time soon.

And while some of us would be happy to see the AVA system scrapped and to start all over again, that is just a pipe dream. And when our morning newspaper lists abandoning the AVA system as one of five things that would make California better, it is indulging in a kind of intellectual self-pleasuring that is very far removed from reality. No, let’s not scrap the AVA system and replace it with nothing. If it becomes an abject failure, it will die of its own weight. So far, even with many AVAs that could have been better defined, the AVA system itself is one of the best things that has happened to California wine, not one of the worst.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
Warning: Alcohol Can Spoil Your Day

Sun, 10 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

But only if it is over 14%.

By Charles Olken

I have a friend named Jack. I call him Jack to protect the innocent because his name is not Jack, and it would be silly to call him Jon Bonne or Dan Berger. Jack works in a winery tasting room, and he used to like his job. Lately however, he tells me that large numbers of people come into his tasting room and the first thing they ask is, “Which of your wines is under 14% alcohol?”

My friend Jack is an honest man; he always tells the truth. “Well, folks, this is a Zinfandel house, and we don’t have any wines under 14% except for the Rosé and the late harvest Viognier”. As often as not, what follows is a wrinkling of noses, a furrowing of brows and a hasty retreat towards the door. Jack asked me to explain this strange business to him, and all I could say is that the world is panicking. Someone is spreading the rumor that one cannot get drunk on wine at 12.5% alcohol but will get pie-eyed, potted and pissed (to use the colorful British argot) if you drink wine at 14% alcohol.

You, dear readers, know better. You know I am not talking about you. You can do the math. You recognize fiction when you see it. You would not fall for the irrational argument, “I can drink four or five glasses of 12.5% alcohol wine and not get a buzz, but more than one glass of 14% alcohol wine and I am likely to fall asleep face down in my spaghetti and meatballs”.

That’s how it is here at Connoisseurs’ Guide. You and we are all rocket scientists and we can count. Apparently, those other folks cannot. So, I am going to help them.

Hey, you out there. Don’t panic. My friend Jack will be out of a job and you will miss out on a lot of good wine. So, let’s say that you like to drink half a bottle of wine per night. Some say that is a bit much, but it’s a nice round number, half a bottle, so let’s say that is what you drink. And let’s specify that half a bottle is 12.8 ounces of wine. It’s actually 375 ml, but I’m old and a half bottle to me is still 12.8 ounces.

Besides, it proves my point to use that number. If the wine you drink is 12.8% alcohol and you drink half a bottle of it, you can drink almost the same amount of 14% alcohol. Oh, sure, maybe you have to drink an ounce less, but let’s face it, you can cut down a bit in order to drink Zin with your meatballs and red-sauce. It just seems so wrong to be drinking Albarinho or Riesling or Rosé with dishes like that.

I worry that alcohol will spoil your day. Not excess alcohol. We don’t do that here. We know the numbers and we know when to stop. But rather, too little alcohol, and too little of the character that goes with your burgers or ribs or Veal Oscar. That is the real problem. There is nothing wrong with Riesling or Unoaked Chardonnay or Rosé. Riesling is probably my favorite grape in the world. But not with my burgers or ribs. Who eats Veal Oscar these days?

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Three-Dot Journalism Lives

Fri, 08 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There is a reason why people wrap fish in newspaper, and mostly these days, that is because that’s all newspaper is good for. Just look at the latest maundering of our leading dailies.

The New York Times, which surely has better things to do, has managed to attack a Congressman who is doing his job for his constituents. You can read the details over at SteveHeimoff.com where the inestimable Mr. Heimoff has impaled the NYT for its hatchet job on the guy who just happens to represent wine country. We are still waiting for the winewriting side of the Times to object on the grounds that speaking up for wineries against the intense lobbying of the wholesale industry is not a crime but an act of great intelligence. Wine is, as you know, the single most valuable finished agricultural product we produce here in California. I have a high opinion of the NYT generally, but this kind of gotcha journalism is nothing more than fishwrap.

The San Francisco Chronicle has a wine editor who does not like California wine. There is just no other way to explain a set of opinions that appeared in print last Sunday in the Chron. We are told that the way to improve California wine is to ignore Pinot Noir, to abandon the AVA system, to move on to grapes which such high standings around the world as Vermentino. In short, we need to start over. All you winery folk have apparently got it all wrong, and you are leading the poor consumers astray. It’s a good thing I am into recycling because now I have plenty of wrapping to take with me to the local fishmonger. I like fish, and, as the cook for my grad school housemates, I was delighted when Friday rolled around because I could go out and find a nice piece of sole or salmon or a mound of scallops to prepare. My fellow Bostonian and very Irish-Catholic roommate, named Kennedy but not those Kennedies, used to say, “Charlie, you could forget once in a while”. Well, its Friday today, and those newspapers are going to be turned into fishwrap.

It’s summertime, finally, here in California. For a month or so, when things stayed cold and wet, it seemed like we were in for another challengingly late and light vintage that paralleled our 2010 experience. For sure, things are behind in wine country, but the weather has been sunny and seasonable warm in the vineyards, and if we do not mess things up, do a little crop-dropping as needed and do not panic the way some folks did last year, we can still be just fine. There is nothing wrong with a harvest that runs a bit late. Hang time is not just for overripeness. It is also for full maturity, and in years that are cool, long and not disastrous, we often get our best wines.

I tend to like a little salt on my fish. Perhaps, I can kill two birds with one stone and use the same grain of salt I now apply to what I read in newspapers for the fish that I will wrap in them.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
If It Ain’t Broke-—Break It

Thu, 07 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If you are a professional critic, then you are in favor of critical reviews. If you are not a critic, then you must take an oath to destroy criticism as we know it.

Everywhere one turns these days, some one is attacking wine critics. And the predictable thing about their rantings is that those who criticize the critics aren’t critics. Some are rank amateurs. Some want their brand of criticism to be the new paradigm for criticism. Some can’t make up their minds.

Take my good friend and adopted Internet son, Joe Roberts, whose blog entitled 1WineDude reviews wines in twenty words or less and gives those scores with letter grades. Joe, who I have predicted is going to be part of the generation of wine writers who replace folks like me who are rapidly approaching our “sell by” dates, is often critical of wine reviews by professionals even as he is penning his own reviews. I have always found that a bit odd, but he’s young, and he is trying to learn and is growing a lot faster than most of the amateurs on the Internet.

The other day, Joe Dude suggested something even more radical than short reviews with letter grades. He proposed giving everyone a big “I like it” button that they could push when they tasted a wine they liked. Kind of an interesting idea. A bit like Zagat guides and TripAdvisor. Everyone gets to vote. What could be more democratic?

I kind of like the idea. After all, I do cast my ballots on Zagat for San Francisco, and for other cities when I visit them like London and Paris. I am headed off to Boston in a couple of weeks and I will probably stick my two cents in on the restaurant scene there. I grew up in Boston, have family there, and go back often so I both know a bit about the restaurants there and am always on the prowl for new ideas.

Wine could be reviewed the same way, says Joe Dude. But I would hasten to point out that we already have a couple of “voice of the people” review mechanisms. They are called Snooth and Cellar Tracker. Some people love them. Others won’t go near them. That is what makes horse races—differences of opinion.

There are only two reasons to read a bona fide wine critic. The first is that some of us know what we are talking about, and even if we don’t, we have established track records. People read CGCW or The Wine Advocate or any other review vehicles because they have a sense that those critics won’t steer them wrong most of the time. If we do not get it right for a given palate, then the owner of that palate is going to look elsewhere. So, there is a certain endorsement that comes with having paid subscribers.

But, even that is only part of the reason to read one or more of the established critics. The chances are that any of us are going to be right often enough to have earned our meager reputations. Still, it is the timeliness effect that will always separate the critics from the public voice. Let’s say that you are a Zinfandel buyer and you see that the wines of Storybook Mountain, Rock Wall, Ridge and Carol Shelton have all come to market. And let’s say that these wines interest you but not enough for you to buy a bottle of each and to taste them blind before you make a large purchase. And let’s further say that you can’t wait for the voice of the people, with their “like buttons” to finally speak having assembled their several thousand opinions of this year’s Geyserville because the wine will be gone from the market before the final opinion in.

The reasons why critics matter, and will always matter in areas of taste and choice among expensive alternatives, is that good critics speak with clear voices, and they speak when the wines are still in the market place. Maybe the “like button” will work for the various offerings of Kendall-Jackson, Beringer and Gallo Sonoma, but try waiting for the “like buttons” to work on Williams Selyem or Dehlinger or Staglin or Shafer and you will find yourself shut out from those wines.

It is a simple equation. Knowledge counts and timeliness counts. The “like button” comes with neither.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Who Says That California Chardonnays Cannot Age? Wrong Again, You Naysayers

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I remember a time, more years ago than I would like to admit, when my cellar was orderly and I knew where everything was. It has been awhile. These days, I have lost track of what is where, and, if truth be told, I am regularly surprised at what I find when rummaging about among long-forgotten bottles. This past weekend I went looking for something special as an accompaniment to roast chicken with morels served with a simple pan-sauce, and, as Chardonnay is still on the tasting schedule hereabouts, I thought something a bit older might be a nice break from the scores of very young wines that have been our near-daily diet.

I quickly spotted a couple of good candidates on a shelf of Chardonnays that I honestly did not remember setting aside but figured that I must have liked them early on else why would they be in the cellar. I suppose that I could have sifted through the CGCW on-line archives to be sure, but I was more in the mood for discovery than validation, and I wanted to see the wines for what they were without prejudice and expectation. I would, I decided, see what we wrote about the wines after the fact.

Now the two Chardonnays in question turned out to be the HDV Los Carneros 2004 and the Newton Naturally Fermented 2001 from Napa and Sonoma Counties. Each of the wines, while very different in style, turned out to be delicious and, while one had grown into anticipated beauty, the other surprised by exceeding all expectation…not to mention our own predictions from some seven years back.

The HDV was altogether exquisite stuff and a reminder of just what aging can bring, of why some wines are worth a wait. The wine was still fresh and vital with a riveting sense of layered complexity that was only hinted at when young. It was the kind of wine that makes you take notice from the very first sniff, and it was the kind that continued to evolve in the glass and involve as only a great wine can. It was nothing less than a true Vin de Garde that was apparently unaware that California whites could not age, and it is a wine with a fine future still. It turns out that it did, in fact, receive an enthusiastic *** CGCW rating when reviewed back in 2007, and I confess to feeling a bit of quiet satisfaction that we made the right call. The business of predicting where a wine will go is, after all, one of educated guesses. While one counts on experience and practice in making those guesses, they are guesses nonetheless, and a little validation from time to time can be nice.

The second wine, however, was the surprise of the night. It seems that we were not wholly enamored with the Newton when originally tasted in 2004 and thought it a bit heavy and too hot for its own good. Had I taken time to read the review or to notice that it claimed 15.4% alcohol on the label, I would have most likely passed it by and selected something else as a foil to our savory, richly sauced chicken. Not only had it held up remarkably well, it was a generous and wonderfully juicy wine that was rife with sweet, caramel-accented apple-like fruit…at ten years of age! It may have lacked the exquisite complexity of the HDV, but it more than made up in richness and depth for what it lacked in filigreed refinement. A great wine? No…but a very good one, and one whose unabashed ripeness should have seen it fray and fade early on—if the so-called conventional wisdom of the day is to be believed. I would not hold it up as immutable proof that all ultra-ripe wines hold such promise, but, in this instance, there was literally nothing threadbare about it, nothing overly hot, no sign of decay. It was a reminder of the pitfalls in judging a wine first and foremost by its ABV -- pitfalls I might add to which I am not immune -- and it grew into a far better wine than I would have guessed.

The point of my Wednesday rambling is NOT to rekindle the wearisome alcohol wars even if there is a bit of a learned lesson nonetheless. No, the thought that has been with me for the last couple of days is just how much pleasure can come from patience. Not every wine ages well, and there are plenty that want no aging at all. Those that can and do, however, offer something that their boisterous young counterparts simply cannot. Somewhere in the life of every wine lover comes a time when “off the rack” is not good enough, and a wine cellar of one’s own, however modest, begins to make sense.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Pinot Noir Wins The Fourth of July Shootout

Tue, 05 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Let the world have its County Fairs. I have the Fourth of July Shootout. And this year, the results are in. Pinot Noir bested Zinfandel, Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon in that order.

Put in pseudo-scientific terms, the Fourth of July Shootout is a consumer-based tasting of wines across a broad spectrum. Every wine tasted is personally selected by yours truly from wines that have been recommended in Connoisseurs’ Guide. They are poured for a cross-section of regular wine drinkers and the winner is determined by that most precise of methodologies—which bottle gets emptied first.

I assemble this same panel every year on the Fourth of July in the afternoon, after the great Alameda parade has passed by, for the express purpose of consuming great quantities of beef. I would love to tell you more about the great Alameda parade (it lasted an hour and a half this year), but what is there to say about a parade of flatbed trucks with high school bands, children in every sporting uniform that appears here on our island in the Bay and new Mercedes convertibles with every possible politician waving to crowds and no one really paying attention to them. I took all this in with a glass of decent bubbly in my hand, and that glass of bubbly made things a lot more palatable—so to speak.

I try to avoid the parade most years, but even a curmudgeon has to get out once in a while and sit there whilst half of Alameda parades by for ninety minutes and the other half lines the sidewalks. No one is excused. But, giving credit where credit is due, the parade does a decent job of working up an appetite for the long-cooked proteins that are about to follow.

This year, it was friend Joe who was doing the cooking and he had his own parade—of marinated tri-tips just waiting to be called into action. The Olkens do the cooking for this event every few years, and we specialized in 24-hour brisket that imitates the incredible barbecued brisket we found in Austin, Texas hill country years ago courtesy of the Salt Lick Restaurant.

But cooking for the Shootout is only an occasional thing. Providing the wine is where the Olkens really shine. And it is in the measurements of wine consumed that the Shootout provides perhaps the finest test of consumer sentiment this side of the Pedernales.

In past years, such events have seen Pinot Grigio inexplicably best all of the reds. This year, we could not give the stuff away. Cabernet Sauvignon is often the big winner, and that is to be expected because we make more Cabernet here than any other red wine, and every wine on the Fourth has already been certified recommendable by the pros. The problem is that the pros on our tasting panel may know what the wine geeks like, but they are often out of touch with the ordinary punters.

On the Fourth, at the Shootout, with its assemblage of friends and neighbors, there are no pros out there to skew the results. These folks are drinkers, not geeks, and what they drink always fascinates the hell out of me. This year, it was the Pinot Noir—Stemmler Russian River to be exact—that took top honors. I am not one for Zin with beef, even marinated beef, but the Novy Zinfandel was the second fastest consumed bottle while the Rock Syrah came third and, to my surprise, Prevail West Face Cabernet, a great bottle by my lights, brought up the rear.

Here is my quick analysis of the results:

--Pinot Noir has surpassed Cabernet as the “go to” wine for this crowd. Indeed, several folks commented that it was because it was a Russian River Pinot that it was so well liked. It is worth noting that no one complained about an alcohol level above 14%. These were drinkers, not geeks from New York, Burgundy aficionados or sommeliers.

--I wondered, because the Cab was from the Alexander Valley, whether its appellation held folks back. They may not really know where the Alexander Valley is (one person insisted that it was where Boonville was until it was pointed out that he was confusing the Alexander Valley with the Anderson Valley), but they do all know about Napa Valley. Was there a snobbism factor at work here?

--It struck me that most people tasting these wines had not heard of any of them. No one knew, for example, that Novy is the label used by Siduri for wines not made from Pinot Noir. From past experience, I know that several of these folks swoon at the mere thought of Siduri Pinot. Novy? Who dat?

Well, it’s Tuesday morning and it’s back to work. Blind tasting and serious tasting notes will follow. But for a brief bit yesterday, it was the consumers who spoke. Ultimately, it is their voices that make or break the wine biz, and Fourth of July Shootout rates right up there with that other event “What White Wines Compete With The Egg Nog” at the neighborhood Christmas party as a measure of what the real world is drinking.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
Come Fly With Me

Fri, 01 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I note with jealousy that Alder Yarrow (Vinography) is off to Greece, that countless Chinese journalists are apparently jetting their ways to Bordeaux, that every one is traveling everywhere—except me. It’s time to stop this payola. It is perverting the cause of caustic wine journalism.

That is the case that is being made in some circles. Actually, it is the case that has been made ever since the first wine critic took a trip that someone else paid for. I don’t get many of those trips. I guess covering California wine is probably not the ideal way to be invited to new and exciting places. Don’t get me wrong. I will drive up to Rutherford in a week or so to taste some pretty spectacular Cabernets in a setting that the average punter cannot possibly duplicate. And my reward for a day in wine country will be lunch on the veranda accompanied by several dozen other writers and the very winemakers whose wines we will be tasting.

It’s not that I dislike such trips or that I turn them down when offered. Over my thirty five years of writing, most especially when I had columns in the Los Angeles Times, I did manage to get to Australia, Chile, Italy and Spain. And, believe me, I have no complaints about any of those trips. Oh, and did I mention Argentina? What a treat to arrive in Buenos Aires and be escorted through the terminal by armed police. Tough place, that Argentina. Loved the wine country though.

There is, however, a requirement that I have imposed on myself, and I would see imposed on all journalists who make these trips. I never judge wines while on the trip. Sure, I taste lots of them, and I like quite a few, and indeed, love some. But there has never been a tasting note in Connoisseurs’ Guide or in one of my newspaper columns about a wine that was tasted at the winery with the label showing. When I have done evaluative reports on the wines of those places, it is with wines purchased here and tasted blind with the regular CGCW tasting panel.

So, go on your trips, you lucky devils, but please remember, you owe it to your readers and to your reputations to avoid the need to pay back those trips with reviews not conducted with appropriate rigor and independence. Sure, tell the story. I loved the articles that came out of my trip to Sicily, because I loved Sicily, but the wines, no matter how great they were, were not evaluated based on something I tasted while being regaled by the winemakers. Indeed, I liked Sicily so much that Mrs. Olken and I are planning to go back next summer on our own.

My next trip is to Nova Scotia. Turns out that there are wineries there. They don’t know that I’m coming, and maybe I will have something to say about the local wines if there is anything good to say. But this is my trip, not theirs. And, while I will happily trot off to South Africa or Champagne or Portugal if invited, you can count a full and honest look at any wines worth talking about, based on what I taste when I get back from wherever my wanderlust takes me—on my nickel or someone else’s. It is the standard to which we should all be held.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
Dan Berger Called Me . . . . . . To Discuss Wine Critics

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Over the years, I have taken Mr. Berger’s name in vain numerous times. Lord knows he deserves it—but that is another story. So, when I was informed that he was calling, it was with great trepidation that I picked up the phone.

In fairness, Dan has given me an earful or two over the years as well. We are like a couple of bull walruses butting heads. In order for us to agree on anything, we first have to argue about it. Anyone who knows us both will recognize that we are not immune to argument at the drop of an opinion, yet I had not spoken to or about Dan for weeks, or at least days, so I could not imagine what bone he wanted to pick with me this time.

Turns out, miracle of miracles, that Dan called to say something complimentary. He had read my editorial about wineries afraid of the media and phoned up to tell me that it was spot on. I naturally reacted with all good graces and did not tell him that it was an anecdotal story that in no way applied across the board. Well, what I finally gleaned from friend Berger is that he gets a bit of stick from wineries that find his brand of rhetoric too narrow or too challenging or too something or other.

So here is the truth, as told to Dan. Wineries do not trust writers because we are not cheerleaders. When we do not applaud them or do not applaud the categories in which they are working, they get upset and they say so. My views on Chardonnay are somewhat more broadly accepting than Dan’s, and thus he gets far more pushback on that subject than I do.

I don’t want to make too much more of this except to say that one need only look at the large number of comments from winemakers who felt their efforts with Syrah were being assaulted and insulted, deprecated and denigrated because I am not ready to anoint Syrah generally as the second coming of the vinous nirvana. Okay, I get it, and so probably does Dan. Conversation, discussion, presentation of another point of view is what the comments section of the CGCW blog should be about. Many of the winemakers who provided their views understand that equation. I hope they all do, and I hope that they will back up their beliefs with wines that can be judged blind against what I think are very good standards.

But I will repeat what I said above. A good critic tells the truth as he or she sees it, and the value of that criticism is not measured by how well it plays with the winemakers. A good critic is not a cheerleader—and that is why some wineries are afraid of the media and others get upset at times with what gets written. It has always been thus in the continuing struggles between purveyor and critic. And, if that essential equation ever changes in favor of the purveyors, then the wine-drinking public for whom we write will be getting short shrift.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Why “Easy-Drinking and Tasty” Is Sometimes All My Palate Needs

Wed, 29 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Now don’t get me wrong. I do not happen to think that California is in some sort of vinous free-fall and in desperate need of a new varietal savior, but I do wish that someone hereabouts would take Gamay seriously. Good Gamay has always struck me as one of the friendlier and eminently versatile red wines to be had. It is a wine meant to be drunk from big glasses. It has enough fruity substance to stand up to juicy rib-eyes hot off the grill, it will wash down simple roast chicken, and nothing makes a better partner to the noble hamburger. Maybe it’s my “California” palate, but I like my wines to be fruity and flavorful. Gamay fills the bill.

It is summarily overlooked in the rush for complexity and richness, and there is nothing at all fashionable about such an easy-to-quaff wine. I understand that there is little financial incentive for vintners to make the stuff when a really top-flight Cru Beaujolais might command but $25.00 or so, but Gamay is not as temperamental as Pinot, it does not need that lengthy elevage of Cabernet Sauvignon, and its singular lack of dissuasive tannins means it is ready to gulp as soon as it hits retailers’ shelves. It does have a few things going for it. Gamay may never win raves with cult-wine collectors, but it can provide plenty of pleasure albeit with a lighter hand. It strikes me that there is a wide-open niche just waiting to be filled.

The catalyst for today’s wishful thinking was a bottle uncorked the other night with a plate of reheated braised oxtails after an afternoon of tasting new Cabernets. I was tired. I felt jaded. I did not want to think, and I suspect any suggestion that I might want to take notes during dinner would have been met by unbridled malice. We have been tasting our ways through scores of new Cabernets here at CGCW over the last couple of weeks, and I just wanted something red, something lighter, something that could be poured with no need for thought. That at least was my aim, but a randomly grabbed bottle of the 2007 Fleurie "Les Garants" from Pierre-Marie Chermette changed everything.

It was one of those “wow”moments that we sometimes talk about -- one of those epiphinal snippets in time when suddenly everything seems to make sense. I took one sip and, with a start, looked over to my equally wine-critical significant other. She had the same look of “oh my, what is this?” in her similarly widening eyes. The wine was no more than simply delicious, but, in its simple deliciousness, it was the perfect thing. It was Beaujolais, but it was quintessential Beaujolais, and nothing just then, not Chambertin, not Chateau Latour, not Staglin Cabernet Sauvignon, not Henschke Hill of Grace Shiraz could have been better.

Now, I am not here to argue that any Fleurie can possibly compare with such wines in terms of compelling complexity, and I am not holding my breath in anticipation that someone in California is going to seriously embrace Gamay, but that is not really the point of my ramblings. There are times when wonderfully “tasty” is damn near as good, and, that, dear readers, is the real message today. My evening of oxtails and Fleurie was a much needed reminder of the magic that good wine can work, and of why after nearly forty years of sniffing, sipping and spitting, I think that I may just be starting to learn something.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Will The Real Syrah Ever Stand Up

Tue, 28 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I like Syrah. You like Syrah. Then why is it such a drag on the market? This is no “dog” of a grape? No “treat me right or I’ll turn on you”.

So, “Why”, I ask, are California Syrahs constantly dissed by critics, not treated with great joy by the market place and needing to be blended into everything but sparkling wine in order to use up the surplus that comes out of the vineyards? Part of the answer is found in that very nasty word, “surplus”. The imbalance between supply and demand is the result of too much Syrah being planted in too many not so good places resulting in too much wine that does very little to make itself unique.

And the concept of “unique” gives us the second part of the answer. Syrah is limited in placement in France primarily to the Rhône region, and there, primarily to the northern Rhône where it is the only red grape allowed. In the southern Rhône, of course, Grenache dominates, and while Syrah is gaining ground, it remains in an all but hidden role as a blending grape among the dozen-plus varieties that are allowed in that region. But there is more to the Syrah story in France than that. With the exception of a few overripe Bordeaux wines of the last ten years or so, Syrah has been unique in France among red grapes in its ability to give the world a supply of sturdy, fleshy red wines of quality. Such is simply not the case here in California where we can get and do get almost everything ripe. Thus, Syrah is not as "unique" here as it is there.

To me, however, the biggest hurdle Syrah faces is that its personality is simply not as interesting as Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir or Zinfandel. It is not as widely appreciated as Merlot for its everyday use as table wine, and, over time, there are other red grapes with unique personalities like Grenache and Tempranillo that may offer more of a difference than we currently get from the majority of Syrah. I am not, and Connoisseurs’ Guide is not, in the camp of those who diss Syrah as flat, boring, dull and useless. It can be all of those things, but so too can Pinot Noir and Zinfandel and every other variety when not handled well or grown in the right places.

Syrah, I suspect and expect, will always have a place here. Indeed, as we start pulling out Syrah that is not producing wines of consequence and increase plantings in both the right warmer places like the westside of the Paso Robles AVA and some protected places in cool-climate locations in the North Coast as well as in the Sierra Foothills, we should see a gradual increase in the overall quality of “serious” Syrah bottlings. The proof behind this belief lies in the best Syrahs of the day—wines like the Terre Rouge Ascent and the JC Cellars Buffalo Hill bottling from the Rockpile AVA. And there are plenty of others. What there are also are too many “others”. Whither Syrah”? Stay tuned folks. This story is still being writ.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Why I Drink Chardonnay--Occasionally

Wed, 22 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I have always liked Chardonnay even though I do not drink a lot of it. I must confess some agreement with its too-many critics who whine that it is not a food-friendly wine. I drink Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc on a far more regular basis, but that has more to do with my white-wine dinner choices than with any inherent preference for the grape. When I do reach for a Chardonnay, however, I generally go for those whose opulent richness and wonderfully stuffed styles are just the ticket with more savory fare.

A small but annoyingly vocal troupe of naysayers to the style has been with us for some time, and it has always seemed to me to have had a certain “East Coast” nexus beginning with Frank Prial of the NY Times a good many years back. Anyone remember the silly “Anything But Chardonnay” crusaders who took on the task of protecting us from ourselves? Well, the whine goes on broad-stroke lamentations about high-ripeness and oak, and the logic-defying reach that Chardonnay is in Oz Clarke’s words “the ruthless coloniser and destroyer of the world's vineyards and the world's palates” strikes me as just plain stupid. I really do not get it.

Neither, apparently, do its legions of undaunted fans, and I wonder at times if it draws so much distain for the very fact that so many seem to like it. Perhaps the reasoning goes, if it is that popular, then it cannot possibly be sophisticated. Well, call me a peasant, but when the menu is right, I still find enormous pleasure in the sheer generosity of full-throttle Chardonnay.

The point was driven home last night when reaching for something to drink with an exceptionally tasty meal of fresh, wild, Pacific Coast King Salmon. The flavorful steaks were so rich that they required only the lightest seasoning, and it was obvious that they would easily outmatch any lighter white. We have been pouring our ways through a good number of new Chardonnays here at CGCW in the last couple of months, and the time and setting seemed right for putting a few to the task. After a rather disappointing, bitingly sour sip of the 2008 La Redonne Côtes du Rhône Blanc from Jean-Luc Colombo, we pulled corks from the 2008 Shafer Red Should Ranch Carneros and the 2008 Du Mol Russian River Chardonnays, and, while never less than fully ripe, the wines delivered a combination of balance and brightness and deep Chardonnay fruit was just what the dish needed. As we have found over and over again, big wines can be balanced and full-flavored dishes require no less.

There is no question that Chardonnay can succeed is a good many guises, and lighter, high-acid versions do have their place, but there is a vast number of engaging white wines that can serve in its stead with milder foods. When the flavors get richer, however, the crowd of contenders thins, and expressive, well-ripened, carefully made Chardonnay proves to have precious few peers.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Wineries Afraid Of The Media

Tue, 21 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I tasted a really lovely Zinfandel, Mouverdre, Syrah blend up in wine country the other day. When I asked its maker why he had not submitted it for review anywhere, he said that the media would not understand it.

Now, I will admit that I don’t understand the media much of the time, and I am part of it. But, the one thing about which I am 100% sure is that someone out there is going to “get” the story of about any wine one would like to make. And I am equally sure that my compatriots in wine writing, from those who seemingly like big, rich wines to those who profess to only wanting to drink lighter wines, all have the capacity to understand a Zinfandel-based “Rhône” blend as they do a Grenache-based or a Syrah-based blend.

That’s the beauty about wine tasting. No matter what our preferences and no matter how wide or how narrow we define the range of acceptable outcomes, the experienced members of the wine writing profession like new experiences, seek them out, learn from them. Even those whose mantras seem to include “no wines above 14% alcohol” will not fail to recommend wines above those levels when they find examples they like.

As we talked, this winery owner and I, he then pulled out a Chardonnay. “Well, how about this?” he intoned as he poured a bright-looking potion into my glass. Light on its feet, bristling with acidy energy and possessed of Chardonnay’s green appley fruit, it was a perfect example of the clean, easily liked yet less bombastic style of Chardonnay that is popular with consumers but less so with the wineries. It was also a somewhat simpler and more direct wine, and here again, the winery owner professed his belief that the writing community would not like it because less than fully expressed Chardonnays were not well received in the media.

Okay, he has a point. But it is a point that has a basis. When one makes a simple, clean wine, no matter how well, that wine is not going to “wow” the world. Indeed, that is why this rather nice Chardonnay came with an $18 price tag in the first place.

We wound up talking for a long time about the philosophy of wine tasting, about Chardonnays from various makers, including folks like Freestone, Dutton Goldfield, Bjornstad who are all making versions of this man’s Chardonnay. And we talked about wineries that had been following the balanced style, names like Mount Eden, Marimar, Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars and Cuvaison, just to name a few, who have always made less than bombastic wines but have long garnered favorable reactions from the media. “What’s to fear?” I asked. Most writers, even those who rhetoric these days has been held up to scrutiny in this blog for damning California wine before praising it, do not have impossibly narrow, monolithic palates.

Over the weekend, a phone message was left in the Connoisseurs’ Guide office. “I enjoyed our conversation, and I am going to subscribe and send you my wines”. We taste blind and we tend to like wines of all stripes as long as they are clean and well-made, have a decent sense of balance and “taste good”. That is all I can guarantee my new friend, except to say that I enjoyed the conversation as well because we challenged each other, we looked inside each other’s views and we came away with mutual respect. The wine business should work that way. I am glad that it did on this occasion.

Meet the New CGCW

Friday Fishwrap
The Washington Post Pushes Back

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

First, the Post accused CGCW of “wailing” about the return of underripe, anemic “food wines”. Now, Mr. McIntyre has raised the specter of “vodka wines”. When will this silliness stop?

I have no personal axe to grind with Dave McIntyre. His response to Wednesday’s blog is civil, friendly, thoughtful and thought-provoking. It also closes the gap between east and west at one point and then opens it up again. And, we here in California need to do some pushing back ourselves. There are some essential truths that need stating, and folks like the thoughtful Mr. McIntyre needs to hear them-—not to change his preferences in wine choice but to change his rhetoric so as to reflect reality rather than some half-true construct of reality.

Here is his first paragraph from his comments on our Wednesday blog.

“Charlie - Perhaps the pendulum is swinging back from the focus on "hang time" and "super-ripeness," which creates some fascinating wines but can lead all too often to unbalanced "vodka" wines.”

Push-back 1: Any focus on hang-time is not a focus on how ripe can the grapes get but how tasty can the grapes get. “Super ripeness” is one of those half-true constructs that needs to be debunked. Grapes can be picked at various levels of ripeness. Unless a winery has a market for prune juice, it dare not pick its grapes so ripe that they have lost their ways. Please see the comments on the Wednesday blog from winemakers/owners Tom Ferrell (Spring Mountain Vineyards) and Dave Hanna. Neither of their wineries makes wines that anyone would consider “vodka wines” or over the top or prune juice. And neither do the majority of wineries whose products I review by the thousands every year.

Push Back 2: Mr. McIntyre does now use language like “all too often”, and, of course, no one will disagree that there are wines in California whose character is more reflective of ripeness than of variety or place. Connoisseurs’ Guide was perhaps the first voice decrying overripeness decades ago. Reader and wine savant, Tom Hill, likes to quote our comments from long ago about wine with bad table manners. But, “all too often” is one of those weird phrases that suggests regularity rather than occasionally. And it is that choice of language that the drumbeaters roll out time and time again. There is a “right by exception” quality to that phrase rather than a “substantial body of well-made balanced wines” quality. And that is the problem. The phrasing is simply misleading, and misinformed in my humble opinion.

Well, Mr. McIntyre has more, and his words are again too value-loaded for my taste. I appreciate the politeness and open spirit of conversation with which they are offered, but, here again, they convey an impression of near universality rather than the real truth which is that there are scores and scores and scores again of California wines from producers all over the state that do not do the heinous things that they stand accused of doing. Here again, Mr. McIntyre.

“The emphasis on these trophy wines also contributes to the recent nonsense in the blogosphere that people don't drink wine with food. I believe most people do - it's the showoffs who don't, and we writers tend to gravitate toward the trophy crowd. When we're drinking wine to show off rather than wash down dinner, it doesn't matter if the wine obliterates food. The food is only there to soak up the alcohol.”

Pushback 3: This business of accusing California wine of being showoff wines that do not work with food is only true in the exception. More than that, it was not so long ago that CGCW criticized some Petite Sirahs as being too tannic to enjoy with food only to get inundated with letters from folks who named all kinds of dishes for which they choose Petite Sirah. Their point, and one with which Mr. McIntyre may disagree is that the wine is an integral part of the meal and it can stand on its own alongside the food. Wine does not need to be subservient. Do you want to drink Chablis or Le Montrachet with your grilled salmon filet? Do you prefer Lafitte or Latour? There is no right answer.

Pushback 4: The notion that “the food is there to soak up the alcohol” is yet another value-loaded phrase. It again carries the ring of universality in its very being. The whole paragraph, seen within the context of Mr. McIntyre’s comments in his newspaper, treats California wine as if it were monolithic. In this, Mr. McIntyre is doing a great disservice to his readers. Rather than focusing on the mountain of California wine that is balanced, focused and reflective of variety and place, his overall charge reads as if California cannot be trusted for those desired attributes. That is the nonsense that permeates the drumbeat.

“I haven’t seen anyone advocating under-ripeness when they argue against the excessive power and concentration of too many wines today. They are arguing that such wines too easily become unbalanced and tiresome. Those sound like descriptors you might apply to “food wines.”

Mr. McIntyre has a point. When eastern writers hold up wineries like Donkey and Goat or Dutton Goldfield as examples of folks who are doing it right, they are not choosing to champion the cause of thin, anemic wines. But my “food wines” comments in the blog entitled “Someone Is Killing California Wine” did not refer to balanced wines made in a lighter style. They referred to the ocean of tasteless, green drivel that wineries offered in the early ‘80s in response to the anti-California wine drumbeat of that era. It is that scourge that threatens California again if the wineries listen to those prophets of gloom. Mr. McIntyre choose to criticize that concern that we are headed back to the era of nothingness. He missed the point, as my entry for Wednesday pointed out. I wish he had been a little more balanced in his language because he is still, as far as I am concerned, overgeneralizing and thus misleading in his commentary.

He goes on to suggest, in his comments on that blog entry, that the only thing that separates his palate and mine is his preference for elegance and finesse whereas we Californian are all about power and concentration. That is the nub of the drumbeat that is going to force some vintners back into the anemia of “food wines”. It is apparently useless to keep telling the beaters of the drum to look to the enormous quantity of well-made, polished wine coming from the dozens and dozens of names that have been listed in this blog or that could be listed. There is nothing wrong with a preference for a style. There is an enormity of wrongness in casting California wines as overwrought and all about power and concentration. Personally, I think Mr. McIntyre knows better. And if he does not, then I invite him to taste with me the next time he comes to California. Not every wine is going to be to his taste. But enough of them will be to put the lie to the drumbeat.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
More Phony Baloney--Please Think Before You Accuse

Thu, 16 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Wines that go with food, that are in balanced, focused, etc., are why we here at CGCW got our start in journalism in the first place. We were foodies who discovered wine and became "caught" by it.

But the term "Food Wines" as used in my recent writings refers back to the period around 1980 when too many wines went astray and lost their "essentials" in a rush to meet a theoretical construct of CA wine that could not be produced. It was that rush to satisfy the eastern press that now looks set to repeat and is the basis for the concerns raised in my original post. "Someone Is Killing California Wine".

Tom Ferrell, whose note above chronicles what happened with one producer, was there and saw it first hand. His wines today, from Spring Mountain Vineyards, are not soulless, empty, thin versions and neither are they over the top, overripe, overoaked or sweet.

Mr. Donohue and Ms. McCloud repeat the drumbeat of those who want less from CA wine, but they do so by damning the whole category. Throwing around phrases like "16% is more like it" and "the major culprit is residual sugar" suggests that because a few wines go in that direction, that somehow all CA wine does.

Simply wrong by light years. Most of the thousands of wines reviewed in Connoisseurs' Guide are not 16% and do not contain residual sugar. Winery owner/winemakers like Tom Ferrell and Bill Hanna have told you that their wines do not go where you accuse CA wines of going. I and every other critic, whether we are full-time California writers like CGCW and Steve Heimoff or even Jon Bonne who writes for the San Francisco Chronicle but covers the world and worries constantly about where California wine is going, know better.

Whether you drink CA wines or not is your business, but you owe it to the wines, the broad majority of wines above the lowest price points, and to your own arguments to be more accurate in your commentary.

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Battles Rages On—And The Washington Post Gets It Wrong

Wed, 15 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It’s not unusual for things coming out of Washington to be a little cock-eyed. It takes that town a bit of time to get things right. So, it is no surprise that the Washington Post would not know what is meant by the pejorative term “food wine”.

Perhaps that is why the Washington Post has ridiculously claimed that “food wines” may be the savior of California wine. Back about thirty years ago, California wine was criticized for high ripeness by the writer for the New York Times because he had concluded that our 13% alcohol wines would not go with food. The preferred wines for that eastern scribe were European offerings with 12% alcohol. The result was that many (too many) California wineries scaled back their wines to 12% and wound up with thin, watery, flavorless potions whose grapes had not been allowed to ripen to maturity. We here in California dubbed them “food wines” as a polite way of saying that some wineries had bowed to labels and forgotten about things like taste, balance, focus.

Enter the new century and California wines have crept up to 14% while European wines are now 13%--or so we are told. Along comes a new generation of winewriters, and it matters not whether they are writing in New York or Washington or, sadly, for the San Francisco Chronicle. These Johnny-come-latelies are all in a dither over alcohol. This time, of course, 13% is okay but 14% is not. It’s the same eastern, euro-palate bias all over again. These guys are the Yogi Berra’s of our time (“It’s déjà vu all over again”).

“Food wines” was then, and is now, a term of derision. Mr. McIntryre of the Post apparently is blissfully unaware of history, and so he is wishing, mistakenly I believe, for those who have not learned from history to repeat it. Please do not.

In my column last week entitled, “Someone Is Killing California Wine”, I decried the déjà vu return of “food wines”. In turn, the Washington Post has dubbed that sentiment as “whining” and has endorsed the return of “food wines”. I forgive Mr. McIntyre for he knows not what he is doing. He is too young to remember the curse of the “food wines” and how quickly California wineries abandoned that trend because the wines generated zero interest—just as the “food wines” of today will also generate zero interest.

Now, let’s be clear. Wines of balance, flavor and focus need not be highly ripe in order to exist. Despite silly pronouncements that wines of that ilk are “California wine rethought” and a trend towards lightness, such wines have always existed here in California. In past columns, I have mentioned dozens of producers who are not new, whose styles are not new, whose visions are not “rethought” but whose chosen path is towards the lighter end of the spectrum. I also mentioned the “rethought” comment to one of the wineries cited as a purveryor of the new and the owner simply laughed out loud, “Of course, it is not new. That style has been around forever”.

So, I forgive Mr. McIntyre for not knowing about food wines, but I cannot be so easily forgiving of those who believe that the salvation of California wine is to reduce its character to nothingness in the search of lightness. Drink what you want, you critics, but for goodness sake, learn about the past. And stop, as the SF Chronicle did this week, criticizing the California style and then recommending wines that are very high in alcohol and very high in pH. I am not arguing with their judgment. I am arguing with their biased rhetoric on the subject.

Meet the New CGCW

Wine and Food Wednesday
Chocolate in Wine...So Who Needs Dessert?

Wed, 08 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

My eye caught Cyril Penn’s oddly interrogative lead line of “Wines with Chocolate are Hot?” on this morning’s Wine Business listing of the past week’s more popular blogs (http://www.winebusiness.com/), and I rather expected to be entertained by said blog with yet one more discussion about the elusive joys to be found in the careful of matching of wine with chocolate. The headline, however, turned out to be an alert (or maybe something more akin to a warning) that fans of chocolaty ripeness apparently have a new fast track to pleasure and need no longer suffer the debilitating and inhibition-lowering effects of high alcohol California Zinfandel to get it. The answer, it seems, is ChocoVine, a new chocolate-flavored red wine from Europe.

With that realization, my first thought was that someone needs to be told that April Fool’s Day is in April, but no, it seems that folks in Holland have come up with a new mariage (huwelijk?) of French Cabernet Sauvignon and Dutch chocolate. No, really, I’m not kidding around here, and supposedly the stuff is taking off in the market with projections of a million case sales in the United States this coming year.

I know it sounds ghastly, at least at first, but it tips the scales at a modest 14% alcohol the way that any good “food wine” should, and it is made with real French Cabernet. It was awarded 90 points and a Gold Medal (cue the trumpets) by Chicago’s Beverage Testing Institute, and it is described on their website as follows… “minty milk chocolate nose. A rich entry leads a lush, velvety, full-bodied palate. Creamy, sweet, flavorful finish”. Hey, it sounds exactly like one of those overripe, over-oaked, high-ticket Napa Valley perverters of terroir to me. Of further note, it costs but a mere $12.00, and it can be readily found at your neighborhood Big Box retailer.

No, I do not think that the likes of Staglin, Shafer, Paul Hobbs and Harlan need to worry, but Moscato might be concerned about its NBT status, because there’s clearly a sweet new kid in town. I cannot say that ChocoVine is high on my gotta-try list of potentially important new wines, but you never know; when warmed up in the microwave and garnished with a handful of diminutive marshmallows, it might prove to be the perfect, cold-morning breakfast wine. I’ll leave it to someone else to find out.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Trash Talk Tuesday

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Some wine blogs never engage in politics talk. Some do. We are among those who do not. Today, we make an exception.

It is hard enough trying to keep up with all the wine in the world, and besides, what does a person’s politics have to do with how well he or she makes wine? Sometimes it is hard to avoid the subject, of course, because it will come up at the oddest times like the dinner we were attending and the host and winemaker made some off-color comments that offended some people in the room. It does not matter whether he was advocating sending his pickers back to Mexico or taking all the land away from the plutocrats and giving it to the pickers. It was out of context.

So, maybe I won’t talk politics. Not my bag, really. Oh, I have opinions. I know who I like and don’t like for their politics. I know whose taxes I want raised and whose cut. But don’t touch my Medicare. Seriously.

Still, on a day like today, when the political news is the stuff of high comedy, it is so tempting to break my rules and jump in. After all, I grew up in Boston, and I “know” the story of Paul Revere. I’m not kidding. Every school age child in Boston knows the story of Paul Revere. He was as famous when I was a kid as Ted Williams and Bobby Orr. We all had to memorize the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem, “Paul Revere’s Ride”. It must have been true or they would not have made us learn it.

“Listen my children and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.

One if by land and two if by sea and I on the opposite shore will be.”

There’s more, and frankly, I have not even thought of those words for years now. But they came flooding back, and amazingly I still remember them. Which leads me to this political observation—all candidates for President should memorize Longfellow’s poem before submitting to press interviews in Boston. It would save a lot of embarrassment, and you can predict that, as surely as the sun rises in the east, the question will now become asked every time a would-be President steps foot in the Bay State.

Okay, enough of that. Let’s talk photography for a moment. For years, all of the photography in Connoisseurs’ Guide was the product of the editors. We would lug heavy camera bags with all kinds of lenses around with us on every trip to wine country. That all changed, of course, with the advent of digital photography. At first, we bought all new cameras, and then newer and better versions. But, in all that time, we never took a picture of ourselves in our underwear or posed topless with our pseudo muscles hanging out. The next time one of these silly guys in Congress gets a hankering to take a picture, I suggest he go out to wine country. On the whole, the world would rather look at the landscape then their puny bodies.

I can’t afford to shop at Tiffany’s—or at Harlan, Bond or Screaming Eagle for that matter. But, if they will just extend me a line of credit, I can upgrade the contents of my wine cellar in a flash. No more searching through the pages of Connoisseurs’ Guide for the Best Buys so I can save a few bucks. I want the best, and all it takes apparently is a little credit. Sign me up.

Well, there you have it. Even when I try to talk politics, I come back to wine. Let’s tell those folks back in Washington to mellow out and to open up the wine shipping laws for everyone. Now, there’s some politics I do understand.

Meet the New CGCW

Monday Manifestos
The Missouri Compromise of 2011—I Will Drink Their Wine

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Compromise of 1820 was about admission to the Union. The Compromise of 2011 will see me drinking Missouri wines in a fancy restaurant out in 4-H country whose wine list looks more like something you would find in New York City or Paris.

Just to refresh your memory, and admittedly, I had to refresh mine after I hit upon the title for this article, the Missouri Compromise had to do with admitting Maine and Missouri to the Union. Missouri was admitted as a slave state and Maine was admitted as a free state. But this is no history lesson except as it will certainly presage my encounter with a range of Missouri wines.

In a teacup, here is the story. Mrs. Olken and I and our eight-year old granddaughter are off to Kansas City to visit relatives and to see the new, modern additions to the Nelson-Atkins museum there. One of the KC folks does the exhibits for that museum and it is time to see it, and to allow our granddaughter to visit her cousins on their home turf. Turns out that our niece and her husband are more than just wine drinkers, as we discover every Thanksgiving when they come to visit and Steve (he’s the husband) asks “what do you have open, Charlie?”. Steve likes my wine, which is just fine because I do too and he is the one relative who actually knows something about wine.

Well, Eliza and Steve have hatched this plot to take Uncle Charlie and Aunt Therry to dinner on Saturday night, and they swear that the drugstore in Smithfield out in the countryside is actually a fine place to eat. Now the Olkens have eaten in well-regarded places all over the world, or at least in those parts to which we have paid a visit, but 4-H country has never struck as the source of fine eats. We did have a giant steak, and well-prepared at that, in Havre, Montana years ago, but, all in all, we don’t go searching for great food and extensive wine lists out on the prairie.

Turns out, of course, that the Justus Drugstore Restaurant does have a web site with menu and wine list, and there are dishes on it that one will not see in San Francisco or Paris. But there are few wines that would not show up elsewhere because, at least in the version of the wine list online, most of the wines are from Europe. I did notice a Missouri Mourvèdre recommended as a by-the-glass choice for one of the main dishes, and that leads me to believe that there may be others.

One of my rules for traveling to far-flung regions is that I need to drink the local wine if it exists, and if the locals do not refuse to drink it. I get the impression that Missouri wines are treated that way in Missouri, but that is not going to deter me. Nor, however, will it deter me from bringing something special from California. The relatives don’t seem to drink much of the local tipple, and they do always lug home a case of wine from California on their annual visits here, so I will not be embarrassed to pull an old and interesting wine out of the cellar. Bags fly free on Southwest, and we will have one big bag of clothes and one box of wine, most of which will stay with the relatives but one of which will go with us to dinner.

We head off at the end of the week and will report back and what we find. But, we will drink the local wine. It is one of those rules to live by.

Meet the New CGCW

Sunday Serendipity
Found In Wine Country

Sun, 05 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If you have not tried your hand at the geography challenge in Friday’s blog, you will find these answers more informative if you read it first. You can’t tell the players without a scorecard and you can’t make sense of the answers below without the questions. I am told by several people that the quiz was too hard, which means that it was not nearly as transparent as I thought it was. My bad on that.

Once you have looked over the hints, and coordinate them with the answers and my reasoning, those hints might make more sense. But you won’t know if you don’t try. Answers and explanations start below the fold.

This one works backwards. The centerfielder is John Fogarty of Credence Clearwater Revival whose vocal work is also featured on Stuck In Lodi Again. From the San Francisco area, one gets to Lodi by Freeway and pulls off I-5 to Highway 12 East. It is not long before swaths of newly planted, trellised vines surround you. But further up the road, you come to old, gnarly vines of several shapes. Lodi is often the butt of jokes and is the poster child for overripe wines, but it is an AVA that extends from the flats up to the low foothills and has several types of growing conditions.

Some time back, on the occasion of our 25th anniversary, my wife and I spent a couple of days in the Champagne region staying at the lovely hotel, the Royal Champagne on a hillside north of Epernay. Our view of the surrounding vineyards in the village of Dizy and their white, chalky soils are what the southern end of the Champagne region is about.

The Margaret River area in Western Australia lies south of Perth by a couple of hours drive. Down under, things get colder the further south one goes and the Western Australia wine region stretches from the warm growing regions east of Perth all the way to the southern shores where places like Pemberton and Frankland specialize in Pinot Noir and Riesling. The town of Margaret River is just enough north of Australia’s southwest corner that it gets weather influences from both the Southern Ocean, as the Aussies call it, and the warmer Indian Ocean. While very good Cabernet Sauvignon comes from this area, it is better known for the Chardonnays from folks like Leeuwin, Thompson Estate, Howard Park and Cullen. Cullen is run by Vanya Cullen and is known for its biodynamic grapegrowing practices.

St. Emilion on Bordeaux’s Right Bank looks like a classic, old hill town. Its clocher (bell tower) sits on the upper terrace of the village, and if you turn around and look at the vineyards behind you, you will discover that they belong to Clos Fourtet.

These days, the Russian River Valley is most noted for the balanced, fruity, keenly focused Pinot Noirs that get produced there. Whether you are like the richness of the wines produced in the somewhat protected area along Westside Road or the more tightly balanced Pinots and Chardonnays from the western boundaries of this rightfully famous AVA, you are in one of the places whose emergence as a producer of fine wines has put California on the world stage in the last forty years.

The Mendoza region of Argentina, stretching south from the large city of Mendoza, lies just east of the Andes mountains and occupies a tilted mesa and low hills at elevations that would be reserved for the Sierras in California. The famous wineries of the Mendoza are centered around Lujan du Cuyo while the Uco Valley, further south, is the newest developing area.

Cuvée Winnie, for Sir Winston Churchill, is the flagship wine of Pol Roger. The reference to Mr. Churchill is brought about by his estate at Chartwell in Kent county of southeastern England. There, near the white cliffs of Dover, in chalky soils sits a small but significant winegrowing region with climate and soils reminiscent of Champagne. Some wags have said that it will be the new home for the world’s best sparkling wines when global warming makes Champagne too warm to produce the very wine for which it is famous.

Friday Fishwrap: Wine Country Destinations
Lost In Wine Country: Where Am I?

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I am visiting wine regions around the world today, and you, dear readers are my guests. But, in order to earn your supper, you have to tell me where we are at each of our stops. Have a look at the descriptions of each place. Do not tell me that they all sound alike, but do feel free to enter your guess about one or all of the locations.

Answers will be provided tomorrow in this space. Or, if you cannot wait, send me an email via the contact button above and I will reply with a list of the locations.

You pull off the highway, turn east towards the hills and you are immediately greeted with swaths of young vines growing in deep soils on table-top flat vineyards. These are the newer vines of the area, but you soon come to vines that have been around for years and years, and they are gnarly, squat stumps with canes that grow out from the trunk and look quite bushy in summer. The locale was once noted for Tokay, but, in truth, it is a red wine region that had an added moment of fame when a guy who wanted to play centerfield found himself here. Almost full credit for getting this one right. Extra credit for naming the centerfielder wannabe.

You find yourself high in the hills looking south towards one of the two noted cities of this region. The soils are white, and the elevation is making you dizy. You would be happy partying here. Partial credit for naming the region. Full credit for naming the city at which you are looking. Extra credit for naming the town in which you are located.

This region is chilled by one ocean and warmed by another, and it is said that the combined influences of these two bodies of water are what makes its Chardonnays so special. A river runs through it, and VC does not mean varietal character but a person who makes organic wines here. Full credit for naming the region. Small extra credit for naming both oceans. Added extra credit for identifying VC.

This hill town seems never to have a bad vintage these days. Indeed, with alcohols approaching 15% for so many of its leading wines, people are beginning to talk. You are standing next to the clocher looking down into a village that has been here for hundreds of years, but it is only in the last decade that it has acquired a can’t miss label. Partial credit for naming the town whose name is also associated with its wine. Full credit for identifying the producer whose vines you see if you turn around and look over the stone wall that once protected the town.

You are standing alongside a river that has given its name to an area that was once the home of blends of red grapes but has now become most famous for making superb wines primarily from one of the world’s most challenging grapes. You know the name so you only get partial credit. Full credit for naming the pioneers of the area. Here’s a hint. They are Tom, Louis, Tom, Gary, Joe and Dave. Extra credit if you remind me of those who came before them and are associated with the area’s main grape.

You find yourself looking over a broad mesa that goes on for miles and whose upward tilt takes you to the base of some pretty serious mountains. Grapes grow at altitude here, but the land is basically flat and dry except for the occasional hail storm that blows in from the mountains. That is why you see all the netting in the vineyards. It is not to keep the birds away but to keep the hail from destroying the vines. Its claim to fame is that it makes oceans of red wine from a variety that no other region has tamed so well. Partial credit for naming the country. Substantial credit for naming the region. Full credit for providing the names of its older growing centers and extra credit for naming the newest addition to the region.

The bonus question. You are looking at chalky soils but if you think about Cuvée Winnie, you will have to swim to get here.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
It’s Elementary, My Dear Watson. Someone Is Trying To Kill California Wine

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It seems that we in the wine business are always announcing the death of something or other. If it is not Frank Prial, once of the New York Times, telling us that vintage charts are dead or Randall Grahm holding a wake for the cork or a movie about a couple of overactive drinkers trying to kill off Merlot, it is the current movement to put any wine over 14% alcohol on the chopping block.

But, like the supposed passing of Samuel Clemens a century and more ago, those reports of the death of Merlot, Syrah, cork and ripe grapes are exaggerated. Merlot, for example, so clearly pronounced as dead by that active prognosticator, Mr. Prial, never stopped selling. Maybe it was given up for departed by a few Pinot drinkers, but the world never stopped enjoying Merlot.

And let us consider the cork. Yes, that villain of the piece, that ruinator of good wine, has not died either. In fact, it has not only not died, but it has seen off, for all intents and purposes, its plastic imitators who themselves turned out to be the destroyers of more wine than the very corks they came to bury. Cork is healthier than ever.

Thirty years ago, California wine country was visited by a plague known as “food wines”. Some eastern-based pundit, and it may well have been the otherwise wise Mr. Prial, announced that California wines were too ripe, too full of themselves and that dialing them back would be a good thing. When the wineries followed suit, for surely the New York Times always gets it right, we were flooded with thin, anemic bottlings whose voices barely rose above a whisper and whose personalities were straight out of the Wonder Bread school. In a word, we wound up with far too many boring wines.

Today, we are threatened with the same plague. Those who argue that California wine is overripe, overoaked, too high in alcohol have failed to realize that the alternative is worse. Trying to make Chardonnay into Chablis is a fool’s errand for California vintners yet that is what some are trying in their own ways. They won’t say so, of course. Indeed, they do not even know what they are attempting with their lowered alcohol, stainless steel wines. But what they are accomplishing is to recreate the food wine scourge of the past.

In a recent Chardonnay tasting, we found wine after wine whose elevated acidities all but drowned out varietal character—and, not to put too harsh a face on it, but some of those wines simply never had a chance to be anything interesting because they never developed personalities in the first place.

Every wine region has wines that do not succeed. And overripe wines with their fruit burned out, their acidities gone, their pHs so high that not only are they flabby now but they have little chance to improve with age are not exactly my cup of tea either. But, if the wineries become so afraid of getting their grapes ripe enough to develop identifiable character, then the resulting wines are bound to fail.

The beautiful underbelly to the new “food wine” movement is that it will only half succeed. It will not die because many wines are already being made with a newfound, enhanced sense of balance. We certainly have a new sensibility to thank for that. But that style will not take over either, because the good never really goes away no matter how much ink is shed along the way.

In the long run, it has turned out that no one killed Merlot, that Syrah while not prospering is also not going the way of the dodo bird and that cork refused to stay in the grave. And so too will wines with personality not disappear in California. Some wines may go too far. We have complained of that very thing ourselves. But, California is best when it makes wines that react to place rather than to punditry. And, it is our fate, whether the boo-birds like it not, to be able to make flavorful, rich wines with balance. It’s what we do when we let place talk.

Wine and Food Wednesday
EXCLUSIVE. New Zinfandels Are Changing The Landscape

Wed, 01 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

After a few nice days a week or so back, the rains have returned here to Northern California, and there are concerned murmurs being heard in wine country. There is no question but that things are pretty well stalled in the vineyard, and, as in 2010, the vines are behind schedule…if “schedules”, in fact, really exist anymore. I do not like to think about the possibility of another downright difficult vintage like the last one, but my more immediate upset has come from grilling with an umbrella in one hand. I mean, really, is it right that it rained on Memorial Day?

I confess to having fought back by firing up the new Char-Griller, grabbing a few good bottles of Zinfandel and making my own sodden statement that barbecue season had been delayed for long enough. Yes, Zinfandel, but not the swollen, ultra-ripe variety but rather wines of the brighter, zestier kind that were once the norm hereabouts. When made in manner that celebrates fruit instead of overarching ripeness, Zinfandel remains one of the most comfortable mates to classic barbecued fare to be found. Bigger, tannic red wines do not take kindly to overt sweetness and acidity in foods, and, just as Zin made with an eye to structure and restraint is a marvelous foil to tomatoey pastas, so too does it find a most sympathetic partnership to the gamut of tangy sauces that define American barbecue from the Carolinas to Memphis to Kansas City.

Now, in all truth, the bold, ripe versions still abound, but there are a few balanced bottlings that fill the bill, and there are hopeful suggestions that more and more vintners are beginning to hear that a good many of us have wearied of high-octane excess. There is much talk these days about a small group of intrepid, cutting-edge innovators who are redefining California wines and about some “new paradigm” that they herald, but, to me it is déjà vu all over again, and I think that to some extent it is just the same old pendulum swinging back to the center…and hopefully not past. We have seen it before. It is said that everything old is new again, and, from where I stand, the time is right for a long and serious look back to the days when Zinfandel was a wonderfully food-worthy wine. I am encouraged by what I see and what I taste, and, if the generously stuffed, plush bottlings are far from extinction, there are more mannerly wines at every price point that have plenty of good things to say.

Here are six recently reviewed offerings that do just that.

91 SEBASTIANI Zinfandel Dry Creek Valley 2008 $24.00
Juicy and focused on the fruitiness of fresh wild berries and sweet spices in the nose and kissed by a dollop of creamy, vanillin oak, this very likeable Zinfandel trades bombast for manners in its aromas and repeats the favor on the palate. Medium-full to full in body and just tannic enough for a useful bit of grip, this one will serve brilliantly today with dishes like pasta Bolognese. It demands little by way of cellaring yet has the depth to hold for a few years and is a great buy at the price.

91 D-CUBED Primitivo Zinfandel Napa Valley 2008 $25.00
From its defined, ripe-berry aromas to its well-balanced palate and its insistent, long-lasting finish, this very confident wine hits all the right varietal marks and does so without concessions to overdone ripeness. Its deep and unwavering fruit comes with a trim of sweet oak and mildly briary spice, and its combination of stamina and real reserve puts it on an ageworthy track with five or more years of very rewarding growth ahead.

88 LIMERICK LANE Collins Vineyard. Molly's Block. Zinfandel Russian River Valley 2008 $30.00
This fruity, mid-sized wine is never flamboyant but always well-focused with plenty of fresh Zinfandel berries showing all the way through. It is very well-balanced and comparatively light on its feet, and, if not one for fans of big, bombastic red wines, it will please folks who like Zins that drink well with food.

88 SEBASTIANI Zinfandel Sonoma County 2008 $15.00 GOOD VALUE
Young and keenly focused on ripe blackberry fruitiness with hints of vanilla and a whiff of cola, this medium-full-bodied Zinfandel is lively and even a bit on the pert, zesty side and will make a fine mate to a variety of red-sauced pasta dishes over the next few years. Its price adds to its charms.

86 CLIF FAMILY The Climber Zinfandel California 2009 $14.00 GOOD VALUE
This easy-to-like wine fills the niche as a fruity, mid-sized quaffer that will drink well with a wide number of dishes. It is geared to fresh berries, and Zinfandel is far more apparent here than are its fractions of Cabernet and Syrah. The latter do not contribute appreciable tannins to the mix, and the wine is a good choice for washing down barbecued fare over the next couple of years.

86 ROSENBLUM Vintner's Cuvée XXXIII Zinfandel California $12.00 GOOD VALUE
Decently focused, relatively direct, slightly obvious in its quite ripe blackberry/raspberry preserves fruit, this wine is perhaps not the most dramatic offering to come down the pike, but with fruit, bracing acidity and varietal focus, it rates as wholly priceworthy.

Tuesday Tributes
Ten Reasons To Like Petite Sirah—Honest!!

Tue, 31 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Forty years ago, when California discovered that the path to glory for Cabernet Sauvignon lay in French oak barrels and elevated levels of tannin, Petite Sirah was writing its own chapter. It was pretending to be the true Syrah, and it had the astringency to prove it.

California’s flirtation with overweaning power gave way a decade later to the “food wine” movement in which muscle was bad and wimpy wines were good. We may be heading in that direction again, and the reasons will be similar. Power will have gotten out of hand, and those whose preference is for wimpy wines have come out of the closet. It is a kind of vinous ying and yang that seems to be repeated with every new generation of wine drinkers.

But this time, Petite Sirah is not the culprit, and therein lies the rub. Petite Sirah, no matter how carefully it is made, is not going to produce easy-drinking wine, and it is no candidate for elevated acidities, reduced ripeness and adherence to the new paradigm of less potent wines. Petite Sirah, it must be said, is simply going to displease those loud voices who are leading us back towards the “food wine” end of the spectrum. Please understand, this column is no attack on those folks. Rather, my purpose is to claim the high ground among wine journalists by insisting that not all wines need to be alike. And in so doing, I would point to Petite Sirah as a wine that will lose its soul if it goes the way of “moderation”.

So, back off, you “voices of reason”, I like Petite Sirah and here is why--

1. A thick New York steak with crushed peppercorns pressed into its flesh, grilled in a black skillet over a hot flame and napped in a reduced Cognac sauce. We served this dish with Petite Sirah recently—brilliant. We served it with Cabernet Sauvignon almost as recently—not so brilliant.

2. Personality. If Petite Sirah does not have that distinct personality, a winery labels it as Petite Sirah at its own risk.

3. The days when every Petite Sirah was so brawny and thick that you could cut it with a hack saw are long gone. Now, a simple steak knife will do.

4. We make Petite Sirah better than the French. Never mind that a Frenchman concocted it out of the marriage between Syrah and Peloursin. Petite Sirah is apparently too strong a taste for the French.

5. Did I say “steak”? Yes, even in this era of eating less red meat, I like the occasional steak, and I like Petite Sirah with my steak.

6. That inventive Frenchman was named Durif. He named the resulting grape after himself. Here in California, we were smart enough to call it something else.

7. When the high-powered wine movement of the 1970s died out, Petite Sirah started to disappear from California vineyards but a band of hearty souls who could not abide wimpy food wines saved it. For years, Petite Sirah was practically an underground cult wine. Petite Sirah has legs apparently—very sturdy legs.

8. Petite Sirah has never lost its potency, but it has gained in relative sophistication. It loss of popularity was, truthfully, caused in part by too much brawn. Its wines are now better able to be enjoyed without the aid of your dentist.

9. Man cannot live on Pinot Noir alone.

10. Did I mention steak au poivre?

Friday Fishwrap
The New Grape Acreage Report—What It DOES NOT Say

Fri, 27 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The new Grape Acreage Report is out and every writer and blogger, some of whom are also writers (snarky comment, that) is rushing his or her interpretations into print. And to be sure, those miniscule changes in acreage from one year to another do have some meaning—but not nearly as much as the amount of ink spent would suggest.

Here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, we are also avid readers of the Report. We make careful note of statistics like Pinot Gris acreage has jumped by 3% while Chardonnay has increased by 1% and Zinfandel has fallen by 1.4%. Heady stuff, of course, and perhaps best left to others to interpret further. Unsaid in the raw statistics, however, are the underlying meanings and conundrums that make wine reporting so much fun.

Here are a few questions that jump out to us and are not answered by the statistics.

Over sixty per cent of all California Riesling is grown in Monterey County, and aside from 15 acres of the grape inextricably planted this year in Stanislaus County, Monterey is the only county to report an increase in acreage year over year. We are great fans of Riesling. Once there were 10,000 acres of the grape growing here. Now it is down to about 4,000—and that is a come back of significant proportions. Unanswered however is the question that continues to gnaw at our thirst for decent aromatic white wines—will California unlock the key to making world class Riesling. So far, the answer is “no”. Increasing acreage is fine and, indeed, heartening, but wouldn’t it be nice if some of that acreage found its way to cool-climate vineyards all up and down the coast in search of sites for truly great Riesling.

Then there is the Grenache problem. We are part of a chorus singing the praises of this red grape. Or to put it more bluntly and honestly, the praises of what we think the grape might do if planted in the right locations. Despite the almost 6,500 acres in California, Grenache is still a Central Valley grape. The two locations from which we have tasted the finest Grenaches, Sonoma and Santa Barbara counties, each had about a ten acre increase in plantings. If Grenache is ever to become the “next big thing” in California, it is not going to be soon.

You may have read that Muscat-based wines are growing in popularity faster than any other white wine. Apparently, they are the Lancers/Mateus/Blue Nun of the next generation of wine drinkers. And in response, there has been a surge of Muscat plantings—almost all of it in Madera and Fresno counties. A light, fruity Muscat is a good thing. A gloppy, low-acid, overly sweetened version, however, is what these new grapes are going to produce. I am okay with that because some of the folks who consume this increasing production will graduate to more serious tipple, and then they will turn thirty and discover that life has not ended. They will become accountants and soccer moms and start drinking fancier wine. And they will subscribe to CGCW and keep this rag in business for another three decades.

My personal love affair with Marsanne is seemingly going to be limited to me, because there is not one acre of the grape reported to have been added to California vineyards in 2010. I am either ahead of my time or hopelessly out in left field. Whichever it may be, those who report on the Report have yet to explain.

I won’t say that I have greeted this year’s Report with a yawn. But, it did put me to sleep momentarily, and that is a pretty good feat since I was watching the Giants rally in the bottom of the ninth inning at the time. Too bad I woke up just in time to see them lose in the 11th. Oh well, they will play again in a few hours. As for the Report, it will be more like the Pittsburg Pirates or the Brooklyn Dodgers—“Wait till next year”.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Wine Without Food? The Horror of It All

Wed, 25 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“Food without wine is a corpse; wine without food is a ghost; united and well matched they are as body and soul, living partners.” Andre Simon (1877-1970)

...well, just maybe it ain’t necessarily so. A recent study reveals the truth. Americans, it turns out, more often than not drink wine without food. Gasp!!

The noted market-research firm, Wine Opinions, finds that those gosh-darned Millennials are the worst of the bunch. Wine, it appears, is increasingly being viewed as a stand-alone beverage as opposed to a dependent part of the meal.

More than a few food and wine commentators have seemed quietly dismayed at the findings and have expressed a certain concern, but for the life of me I really do not see why. Julia Child is attributed to having famously said “a meal without wine…is uncivilized”, and I would not argue the point, but some seem to accordingly think that drinking wine without a meal is likewise the practice of pagans. When I was taking my first vinous steps way back when, wine was the thing, and food was a second thought if at all. It was only a good many years after I had been packing away cases of classified clarets and fine California Cabernets that I began to spend as much time in the kitchen as in the cellar. I suspect I was/am not alone. I did not feel especially uncivilized when pulling yet another cork from a 1970 Beaulieu George Latour or Chateau Figeac or Chateau Leoville las Cases of the same year and knocking back a few glasses not over dinner but simply as a late-evening catalyst to conversation with friends. Fine dining simply did not fit into my graduate school budget, but somehow I always found the funds to keep good wine on hand.

The Wine Opinion study is fascinating, but I do wonder just how these latest numbers in our metric-obsessed era might compare to those from ten or twenty or thirty years back if we had similar data. I have no doubt that far more wine is being consumed by Americans now than in the past…but it is possible that there might not be significant statistical differences between then and now when it comes to who drinks what where. So what’s it all mean? Not much I think other than perhaps a new marketing insight into the ways in which wine can be sold. Fair enough. I suppose I have no problems with anyone who aims to broaden American wine drinking culture, and I am frankly heartened at the idea that a new generation is becoming sufficiently comfortable with wine to ask for a glass in lieu of a beer or a Manhattan or such.

Curiously, however, I have already heard murmurs about how the study helps explain “evolving” wine styles, that this growing use of wines as a beverage only fosters more of the softer, riper stuff (read California et. al.) Maybe it isn’t the critics and high scores (I mean, really, is the wine-as-a-cocktail crowd really buying high-scoring, high-priced, cult Cabernets?). Just maybe it is the voice of a free-market. Maybe it is just people drinking what they like, and, yes, if sipping a glass solo without food, I would rather have something fruity and rounded rather than lean and austere. Others, however, apparently spend nights awake in anguish at the cultural damage done by ripe, very flavorful, high-alcohol wines (there, I’ve said it) that aim for richness rather than structured austerity, and the misdirected, uneducated youth seems likely to only make things worse.

My response to those whose feathers are somehow ruffled by the study’s conclusions is to simply say “take a breath, calm down and relax.” Connoisseurship comes slowly and of experience, and it is a matter of practiced individual taste. With practice comes increased appreciation, and, as I see it, the path to the table is inexorable. Of interesting note in the study, it was older wine drinkers who were most likely to drink the wine with a meal. Incomes and sensibilities and appreciation, I would argue, are all things that grow over time, and high-pulpit preaching about the “proper” situations and venues for wine drinking or rolling of eyes at those would might enjoy a fine Pinot without the requisite duck dish benefits none.

I remember all too well those times not so long ago when fine wine was snobbishly regarded as something whose enjoyment required a special education. These days it is my business to offer opinions about what and why a great wine is, as well as to make comment about those that for me may fall a bit short, but I have yet to see in a wine some special virtue that I believe only the sophisticated few can ever possibly comprehend. It would be a sad thing indeed to return to the days of the tuxedoed, nose-in-the-air, tastevin-bearing sommeliers who were the sole keepers of the truth.

I admit to drinking wine mostly at meal time and I find my greatest pleasures in a remarkable food and wine match, but I do like a glass from time to time on its own, and, as an unrepentant cheerleader for wine in general, I am delighted that so many new wine-drinkers are doing the same.

Monday Manifestos
Let’s Talk Grenache—NBT or Never Wozzer?

Mon, 23 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I will admit it. I was part of the Mateus/Lancer’s generation. Sweet, pink wines that went down easy and made great candle holders. Along the way, I discovered Grenache Rosé from Italian Swiss Colony. It was one of two wines I used to drink before I got wise to Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, the other being Italian Swiss Colony Zinfandel. Most of you are not old enough to remember the “little old winemaker” and his giant winery up in the Alexander Valley. As hard it is might be to believe for some of you, those were the days when jug wines were produced in Sonoma County from old vines. Man, that Zin was a bargain at $1.49.

The Grenache Rosé, probably came from Central Valley fruit, however. It was simple, juicy, probably quite sweet and smelled and tasted of strawberries and bubble gum. It was less expensive than Lancers or Mateus so it had its utility. And the memory of those wines still instructs my sense of what Grenache can be—not should be, mind you, but in our recent red Grenache tastings that will feature in our Rhône coverage in July, there have been several wines that remind of that old-fashioned Rosé. If California Grenache never rises about strawberry quaff, in red or pink forms, however, it probably has no more future going forward than it has had a past over the last several decades.

That said, Grenache does not have to suffer from terminal cuteness on the one hand or overripe dullness on the other. In the hands of the a few successful practitioners, it has shown suppleness and gentleness that reminds of Pinot Noir but with a somewhat lighter, juicier berryish side that may not parallel those pink wines of my misspent youth but certainly is part of a continuum of Grenache possibilities. Whether Grenache will find the right sites and the right winemaking attention to become the NBT (next big thing) or will remain in the vinous backwater is still to be seen. Lots of grapes have potential. Few rise to levels of commercial acceptance, and even grapes like Syrah, which went from nothing to tens of thousands of acres in a few short decades and is accepted as one of the world’s noble varieties, has struggled to make a place for itself relative to Cabernet and Pinot.

The NBT? Chances are that Grenache won’t make it any more than Nebbiolo or Tempranillo or Mourvèdre or Sangiovese ever made it. But, the top entries in recent years give reason for hope. It will take a boomlet of new plantings before we can find out. Stay tuned, but don’t hold your breath.

Friday Fishwrap
This Is The Week That Was

Fri, 20 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

While the wine world, at least the California portion, has spent the week engrossed in Pinot Noir natterings, there are other important things also happening in the wine world and it time to get you caught up. Pay attention—there will be quiz at the end.

ITEM: Doc Vino Asks “Why Is A Flight of Wines Called A Flight”

Only three people volunteered an answer to this probing question and none of them got the answer right. It is called “a flight” because a gaggle or a herd would be less attractive. But, we here at Connoisseurs’ Guide have our own groupings. Consider please: A Pride of Pinots; a Company of Cabernets; an Ouch of Outrageously Overripe Chardonnays; a Murder of Mourvedres; A Torture of Tannat.

ITEM: Flora, of Flora Springs Winery Turns 100

Happy birthday, Flora. You are living proof that a Chardonnay a day will keep the doctor away.

ITEM: Big Napa Winery Deal Signals Return of the Los Angeles Money to Wine Country

You may have already seen the reports of this deal and the hyperventilated rhetoric that accompanied it. Someone has paid $4.7 million for a Napa Valley vineyard property with a winery permit. The actual winery burned down several years ago, and the property had been on the market for some time without takers. Okay, this may be good news, but the other side of the equation is this. This property had been in the hands of the Saviez family since 1900. Since the sale does not include the Saviez label, it seems that the family has not given up the chase entirely. But it is a least a little sad that a long-time Napa family has sold off the family jewels.

ITEM: Italian Wine Overtakes French and American in the United Kingdom

It might be a good thing for the Italian economy, but what does it say for English palates that the place is being flooded by a tidal wave of cheap Pinot Grigio?

ITEM: Maker’s Mark and Wheated Bourbon

This from Reuters: “In Loretto, Kentucky, Greg Davis of Maker's Mark carries on an old family tradition of making bourbon with red winter wheat to stimulate taste buds in the front of the mouth”.

This from a rival bourbon maker: The use of wheat to soften the palate and the absence of rye in the grain blend (mash bill to use the Kentucky term) has led to some of us calling Maker’s Mark “sissy whiskey”.

That’s all folks. As the great Scoop Nitzker has said so famously, “If you don’t like the news, go out and make some of your own”.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday Thorns
I Loves Me Some Terroir—Guess Which Grape I Am

Thu, 19 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

We talk a lot about concepts like terroir, typicity, authenticity, varietal precision, influence of soil type, and often we are just about as accurate as The Farmer’s Almanac—which predicted sunshine today so I could enjoy a baseball game in the same conditions that grapes like—comfortably sunny. Instead it is cold, looks like rain as I am writing this piece, and I have to decide if it is worth freezing my ass off to watch the Oakland A’s play the Minnesota Twinkies.

The grapes, of course, have no such choice. They are just going to have to hang out in the cold, wintery conditions that look, for the moment, like a repeat of the failed summer of 2010. We talk a lot about how provenance affects grape character, and we tend to ascribe the end results to that elusive concept—terroir—about which we cannot even agree on a definition.

But, leaving aside that latter minor concern, I have spent the last day thinking about a question that Tom Hill, surely a guy who ought to be writing about wine instead of folks who are making it up on the fly and inventing new rules that serve only their own palates, asked about yesterday’s blog entry.

He innocently (well, not really, because Mr. Hill is actually posing a somewhat different question) asked why it was that Pinot Noir was better at reflecting its location than other grapes. I started to compose an answer on the spot and then realized that the Mr. Hill might actually have been questioning whether the idea that Pinot gives more differentiation by small differences in location was, in fact, accurate. It is a somewhat different form of a concept floated by the San Francisco Chronicle in its attack on Russian River Pinot when it lambasted the idea that RRV Pinots should be bottled by vineyard rather than as blends from the larger area.

First to Mr. Hill. I have always thought that Pinot and Riesling are the grapes that most strongly reflect the place where they are grown. It is one of those bits of common wisdom that has been passed down over time. I now realize that I have accepted that concept as “learned” without knowing why. As a wine-taster, not a grape-grower, I truly have no answer for Mr. Hill’s question as stated. If I were to guess, as I started to do yesterday, it would be that Pinot Noir (and Riesling for that matter) are nuanced, somewhat delicate grapes and thus will show their provenance more easily than grapes that are less given to subtlety. It is also true that those grapes in their native Europe are, more than any other, grown in small plots with individual names, and thus have been giving us looks at small differences in location whereas other grapes have given us less of that “individualism” based on lesser amounts of vineyard differentiation.

Not a bad answer, that, but one which is loaded with speculation. Which came first? The grapes’ nuanced personalities or the divvying up of vineyard land into small plots and the tilling of those small plots for a couple of centuries?

So, let’s move on to what I think is the real question of interest here. What can we learn by looking at other grapes? Does our experience with them suggest that they do or do not reflect small differences in location?

Christian Miller answered Mr. Hill with a reference to Zinfandel. And if one tastes the multiple Zinfandels now being offered by folks like Ridge, Ravenswood and Rosenblum prior to its sale to Diageo, it is clear that each of those wines from each of those producers offers unique characteristics that separates them one from another. Even leaving aside the hand of the winemaker, which is perhaps every bit as apparent in those wines as the changes of location, it is also true that those wineries’ effort come from such widely variant places as to make them poor cases for speculation about the influence of terroir on Zinfandel. Still, when one looks at the grapes from Hendry Vineyard in the Napa Valley, we know that Block 7 has always performed differently from the adjoining blocks of Zin on the same hillside.

We do not, however, have enough broad experience with small plots of Zin, or really most other grapes even though examples do exist. Cathy Corison, for example, makes Cabernet from adjoining plots in the Napa Valley and chooses to identify the wine from one patch as her Kronos Vineyard bottling. Because she searches out plots that have very similar soil types for her wines, one of which is a very successful blend from spots on the West Rutherford Bench, her choice to bottle the wine from the Kronos plot separately is a statement of recognized and appreciated difference.

Would that we had another couple of hundred examples of such small differences in location for Cabernet. Then we might be able to reach a more educated conclusion. Instead, we need to accept two bits of evidence. Cabernets from Corison do reflect terroir both collectively and individually, and Cabernets from divergent areas do also reflect changes in location. Howell Mountain is different from Mount Veeder is different from Spring Mountain is different from Diamond Mountain. On Diamond Mountain, the wines of Diamond Creek have always been bottled by plot, and those wines are different. But their soil types were also uniquely different, and what we do not know is how much of the difference is soil type and how much is some other land-driven piece of uniqueness.

But here again, the Tom Hill question, in its fullest meaning, rears up and bites us in the backside. Is terroir made up of any difference or must it be small differences that get reflected more broadly.

We know that the Pinot Noirs of the Russian River Valley AVA vary widely from the lands near the Pacific Ocean to those further inland near Westside Road. We know that the Cabernets of the Rutherford AVA vary significantly from one side of the Napa Valley to the other. In that latter case, we also know that the soils are different as well as the nature of the sun exposure (early morning on the westside versus late afternoon on the east).

Not only do we not know why Pinot is uniquely grown in small patches as opposed to Cabernet, but we have no evidence to suggest that Cabernet, if produced in tiny bits, would not also show more uniqueness by location than the conventional wisdom imparts to it. For now, what we mostly know is that some wise men in Europe, choose to create a patchwork in Burgundy but not one in Bordeaux.

If I am allowed one more piece of rank speculation, it is this. All grapes will reflect the places where they are grown to some noticeable extent, and if it had been Bordeaux that had been broken up into a hopscotch array of holdings instead of Burgundy, we might be having a different conversation.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Which Pinot? It Depends On What’s For Dinner—Not Its Stated Alcohol Level

Wed, 18 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We here at Connoisseurs’ Guide have, in fact, been drowning in a sea of Pinot Noir as we ready our June report on 150 newly released versions of the grape. There are worse ways to go, of course, and neither Charlie nor I are yet calling for help.

The truth is that the kitchen counters in both the Eliot and Olken households are lined with a considerable collection of altogether remarkable wines left over from our issue-close tastings, and Pinot has thus been the starting point for a good many meals of late…and I have no complaints.

Pinot Noir, it can be easily argued, is among the most versatile food-friendly red wines around, and it can be made successfully in a number of styles. I am routinely asked by my culinary students about my favorite varietal. “Don’t have one,” I say, “depends on what’s for dinner.” When pressed harder and asked what red grape I would choose if I only could choose one, the answer is inevitably Pinot. Still, my inquisitors inevitably press on, “then what is your favorite Pinot?” “Don’t have one,” I say, “depends on what’s for dinner.” The point of course being that Pinot Noir is no single entity, that there is no one “proper” model.

Even a brief foray into the world of internet electronic blather these days brings the quick realization that diversity of varietal style has become anathema to many, and Pinot Noir seems to be in the cross hairs. We are lectured about proper paradigms and authenticity and correctness. There are lamentations aplenty about how many if not most winemakers have somehow lost their bearings, at least from those commentators to whom the truth has been revealed. “Overripe”, “over-oaked”, “too thin and acidic”, “too heavy and thick”, “not enough fruit”, “too much fruit”, “tastes like Syrah”…sound familiar? If mildly amusing, the debate has also become boring, and the broader beauty of well-made Pinot has gotten lost along the way.

It is Pinot Noir’s very ability to be different, to reflect its vintage and maker and place, that I think, is perhaps its greatest virtue, and it is for me an endless source of fascination and discovery. I simply do not get tired of the stuff. Moreover, I find delight in all of its guises, from refined, racy and elegant to plush, well-ripened and wonderfully rich. I stand with one foot planted firmly on each side of the widening line dividing those who rally behind the banners of “too much” and “too little”, and, frankly, I chuckle a bit at the invectives hurled back and forth. I do not look at alcohol numbers, but I know coarseness and heat when I taste it. I do not care to know about pH and total acidity when I am tasting a wine; I can tell the difference between shrill acids and dulling softness. I simply taste the wines, one at a time, and they are either good or not, and I know when Pinot does not taste like Pinot. When it comes to well-made Pinot Noir, I confess to being an ardent fan of most every style…it depends, you see, on what is for dinner.

Tuesday Tributes
Drink Wine In England At Your Own Risk

Tue, 17 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have not had much luck with wine in England. Not sure why. Must be my own fault—or maybe just bad luck. The English like wine so why has it been so hard for me over the years to find a good bottle to drink across the pond in Olde Blighty?

The Olkens spend a fair bit of time in England. My wife’s family on her mother’s side lives in England to this day, and since my wife spent most of her early days in the UK, it was that group of relatives that became her extended “family”. Between the occasional wine visit (yes, there are wine reasons for a California to go to England) and family get-togethers, we have spent a fair bit of time, most in summer, over there.

It’s not hard to find a good bottle if you know where to look. I just have not found the key. And the news from England suggests that it is getting harder, not easier. Our early refuge for things vinous was the chain of stores called Odd Bins. It existed all over the UK, and even up in the northern Scotland, one could walk into Odd Bins and find a decent selection. And in those days, Odd Bins was owned by Seagrams, which also owned Sterling among other wineries in this country, and it would not be unusual to find a few California bottlings on the shelves as well. Now, it turns out the Odd Bins, having changed hands, is out of business.

I will admit that London is easier. The big department stores have substantial wine sections, and there are lots of specialist wine merchants in all of the posh parts. But, out in the country, visiting relatives from Bournemouth and Bury St. Edmunds and Manchester and Dorking and Cleethorpes, the pickings get a little bit less exciting.

On one trip not so long ago, we were staying with cousins in Dorking south of London and discovered that there was a real, honest to goodness winery just north of town. We called ahead, identified ourselves as important American wine folk and arranged a visit. When we got there, we were shown the tasting room, got a ten-minute discussion from a secretary and were told that we could sign up for a paid tour tomorrow if we wanted to taste. “What if we were from Decanter”, we asked. “Well, they have never been out here, but if they did visit, it would be different”.

We have subsequently visited a number of wineries that have popped up in our travels around England, and the reception has been much friendlier. “Out of wine”, said one producer. “My husband is riding to hounds” said another and swore that she knew nothing of his “hobby”. We did have a fine visit to an old windmill turned winery. The folks could not have been nicer. The wines, well that was a different story.

But our most bizarre visit came when a befuddled owner took us into his winery and asked for our opinion about his late harvest Riesling. It was June and the wine was of the previous harvest, and he was having difficulty getting it to ferment. He poured us a glass and asked if we had any advice about how to cure the problem. Well, the one thing that CGCW has assiduously avoided over the years is telling winemakers how to make wine. But this gent was insistent, and after a few minutes obfuscation, we broke our own rule and advised our new friend to pour the stuff out. It had turned sour, oxidized and had been oversupplied with yeast in his continuing attempts to make it ferment.

It was just a few years ago when the relatives decided that they were going to make sure we had a good bottle of wine. Off we went to a very fine restaurant in an old manor house in the south of England. It was a spectacular location. And the wine for the main course had been hand selected by the restaurant. It was a California wine.

I kid my English relatives a bit about the situation, but the fact is that they are whisky drinkers and beer lovers, and they don’t really get my fascination with the fermented grape. I don’t much mind. Uncle Ron always has a nice selection of Single Malts and he knows every coutryside pub for miles around. A Sunday pub lunch accompanied by a pint of bitters has never hurt anybody.

Monday Manifestos
SF Chron Proclaims RRV Pinot At Crossroads—I Beg To Differ

Mon, 16 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Did you read the wine headline in yesterday’s Chron—“Russian River Faces Crossroads”. Yes, dear readers, if one believes headlines, RRV Pinot Noir is on the precipice. And, lest you miss the point, the Chronicle says it is in danger of following Napa Valley Cabernet into the realm of vinous complacency.

True confession: I read the Chronicle’s Sunday Food and Wine section without fail every week. It is quite possibly the best in the country. But, yesterday, it missed the mark.

Perhaps this is the time to point out that Napa’s vinous complacency has it producing volumes and volumes of very good to great wines. It also produces volumes of not so great wines, and it has been ever thus. That is an equation that has not changed much over the years, but certainly has not changed for the worse. Decanter Magazine, the English wine journal whose love of California’s fancy Cabs has never been exactly over the top, loved the 2006s. Those of us here, or most of us at least, think the 2007s Napa Cabs were a lot better. What kind of complacency is that?

But the Chronicle article would have us believe that the only way the Russian River can save itself from becoming the Napa Valley is a dose of reinvention. This is gotcha journalism gone to wine country. This is RRV Pinot Noir, broadly accused by the Chronicle of suffering from “too much oak, too much overripe fruit, too much heat”. It’s nonsense. The Chronicle is talking about 2009 Pinot Noir. Those wines released to date are part and parcel of the continuum that has brought the Russian River not to the precipice of complacency but to the precipice of greatness. Russian River Pinot Noir suffers not at all. It is performing exactly the way it has always has in its early releases.

Now, dear readers, we critics are not cheer leaders. We are not supposed to lose our objectivity in a rush of vinous love for every drop that crosses our palates. Neither the Chronicle nor Connoisseurs’ Guide nor any other reviewer of competence and honesty is going to like everything—or should. And the early 2009s are unique in themselves—as are the wines of any vintage. Many of them are simple, direct, lacking in complexity and short on the lovely, rich patina that Pinot can get once past its gawky youth. The early release wines of many vintages follow that pattern. Even in 2007, the finest Pinot Noir vintage in my memory, the early release wines were rarely possessed of grandeur.

And the Chronicle is forced to admit, but only after their wholesale swipe at the genre, that the later released wines of the vintage have not yet been seen. The Chronicle tells us that it has tasted 40 Russian River Valley Pinots, but does not tell us what they have tasted. Did the overwhelming lot of denigrated wines include the 2009 Williams Selyems, Peays, Evening Lands. I have tasted those 2009s, and I can and will tell you that they are not overripe, overoaked, overheated, flat and dull. They have shown themselves to be deep, focused and balanced. Those wines (and let’s agree that they are also not the whole picture) are brilliantly conceived, solid and are not be denigrated. But when one reads the article as written, the broad brush of condemnation falls on Russian River Pinot as an entity and it takes those very fine early released wines down with it. Moreover, the notion of “crossroads” suggests that the Chron will find a high degree of disappointment in the Merry Edwards, the Siduris, the Bjornstads, the Dehlingers and the whole array of 2009s that are yet to be seen.

I have no argument with individual choices. I could care less if the Chron liked 20 of 40 or liked 4 of 40. That is their business. If the Chronicle tasted and did not like Williams Selyem 2009 Westside Road Neighbors, we will agree to disagree. That’s the wine biz. But, this wholesale questioning of Russian River Pinot Noir on the basis of a few dozen early released wines and the repetition of the holier-than-thou litany of accusations that get trotted out with every discussion of California wines is silliness piled on top of silliness. It is an unbalanced discussion from a publication of record that should know better than to brand the entity itself as in trouble on the basis of early results.

I respectfully but firmly disagree with that characterization of the Russian River Valley. Ladies and gentlemen of the vinous jury, the question is now laid in your laps.

Satisfying Saturdays
Pinots Finished--Head Still Above Water

Sat, 14 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Just got an email asking if our panel survived our encounter with 40 Pinot Noirs, and I am happy to say that we not only survived but that we enjoyed the experience. Pinot Noir is simply less physically challenging than other reds. Its tannins are lower, its texture is less challenging, its flavors reveal themselves in comfortable layers, and frankly, they are simply very good.

The range of styles runs from firm, tight and promising to rich, accessible and mouthfilling. The lighter, higher acid models make happy mates to salmon, tuna, veal and lighter steak preparations. The deeper, richer wines will be fine accompaniments to dishes ranging from standing rib roast to braised short ribs of beef. We have put aside a bunch of our favorites to serve to our friends tonight with New York pepper steak (the kind with pepper corns, not green peppers and onions) in a cognac sauce.

Lately, California Pinot Noir has come in for tons of criticism. It used to be that Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon were the poster children for the "unacceptable" California style. Now, the boo-birds are attacking Pinot Noir. It makes no sense to us. The wines are deep, balanced, uniquely supple in the way that only Pinot Noir can be. Our reviews of some 150 separate bottlings will appear on June 1, and without giving it all away, I can tell you that we found gorgeous wines from dozens of wineries, mostly centered on the Russian River Valley but also from Carneros, Santa Lucia Highlands and Santa Rita Hills and from both the established Pinot leaders and from newcomers alike.

Friday Fishwrap
I Am Drowning in a Sea of Pinot Noir

Fri, 13 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Well, it could be worse. It could be Petite Sirah. The problem is that there are forty Pinots lined up on the tasting table and they will all need to be tasted by the time the sun goes down and the Friday night whisky hits my glass.

Apologies to Petite Sirah, but forty of them would be worse. We do not usually taste that many wines at one time, but this is our end-of-issue retasting in which every wine that is being considered for two stars (90 points and above) or struck as us flawed or was simply possessed of mixed messages and needed to be seen again will reappear before us.

The first draft tasting notes are all written and the wines will be tasted blind, a personal promise we made to ourselves thirty-five years ago as consumers turned critics. We are not looking for adjectives in this tasting; that work is done. Rather we are looking for quality. If the wines that showed poorly, and wines do sometimes disappoint for all kinds of reasons, suddenly come good, we know we have more writing to do. But, while the judgments of quality and the aligning of the wines in some sort of hierarchical ranking and the subsequent application of a point score is work, it is not as time-consuming as our initial tastings.

Still, we will be at this task for three to four hours and our brains will be tired—even more so than our palates which seem to fatigue less than our mental faculties. We take an occasional break, but it is only when we have narrowed down those final three or four or half dozen most brilliant wines that we relax and end the day with one last sip of the elixirs that are going to earn the truly big scores. Perhaps, because we know we are going to end with the great ones, the day goes quickly enough.

Pinot Noir is our biggest challenge because Pinot, more than any other California-grown variety, is bottled by many wineries in small lots. Wineries like Williams Selyem, Siduri, Testarossa, Kosta Brown, just to name some of the most obvious examples, will have upwards of eight to ten separate wines. And that is why we are drowning in Pinot Noir. We taste more Cabernet Sauvignon in our series of initial tastings, but because most of the great producers do not make a half dozen or more separate bottlings, we wind up with fewer Cabs to retaste at the end of an issue than we do Pinots.

Pinot Noir reflects is provenance so easily that it invites small lots and single vineyard designations. It is why we have so many fine examples, but why many of them are hard to find. Some time later today, we are going to come up for air. We won’t have drowned. And when it is all over and we are sipping those last drops of our favorites, Steve Eliot and I will look across the table at each other and be thankful once again that we taste wine for a living.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
A Tomato Is Natural and So Are Grapes

Thu, 12 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There is something sinister about wine words and the way we throw around value-loaded comments like “authenticity”, “natural”, “organic”, “overripe”. We don’t use those words descriptively. We use them to puff up one concept or another at the expense of competing concepts.

Yesterday, a rather enlightening set of comments about “natural” wine appeared in the well-regarded blog, Catavino. Upon closer inspection, it turns out that those comments are the work of the brilliant observer and occasional winemaker (he would probably reverse the order of those descriptions), Oliver Styles, whose writings at www.wine-life.co.uk have come in for praise in this blog more than once.

In another brilliant essay entitled “It’s Not Unnatural To Be Wine”, and which I have retitled above, Mr. Styles picks apart our concepts of “natural” and does it so convincingly that I fear for our definitions of all the other jargon that get tossed about so freely by winemakers, writers and sommeliers. To put words in Mr. Styles’ mouth, he might say we are all full of tomato.

Our Grade: A+. And, if you want an earful of Mr. Styles comments on the subject, I would strongly encourage you to look in on http://catavino.net/it%E2%80%99s-not-unnatural-to-be-wine-a-skeptics-view/.

Here is how it begins. For the rest of the story, follow the link above—

“Television viewers in the UK will have recently been treated to an advertisement for Dolmio Ragu sauce in which a family of towel-textured, round-faced puppets make lasagne while a voice-over tells us Dolmio tomato sauce is made from ‘100% natural.

“Which is nice if you want to be reassured that what gets mashed into your bowl of Penne hasn’t been developed in a laboratory. Indeed, it’s always reassuring to know that your food hasn’t been put together by a group of escaped Nazi scientists bent on producing a swastika-shaped black tomato without seeds and grown in a Petri dish. We probably wouldn’t buy something like that. Something ‘natural’: yes.

“The point is, of course, that, whether you believe it or not, what goes into Dolmio is natural. A tomato is natural. So is garlic. And onions. It’s rare to find an unnatural foodstuff (margarine, perhaps?).”

Wine and Food Wednesday
Food Wines At Attractive Prices Rule The Day

Wed, 11 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There are great wines and there are good wines, and there are times for each. There are evenings and meals that require the collectable stuff. Then, there is the everyday, affordable fare that most of us drink most of the time. In our Connoisseurs’ Guide tastings, finding a truly good value is more exciting than finding a great wine that we can’t afford.

It is a universal affliction of those of us who become wine-possessed to find special pleasure in the search for and discovery of tasty new wines that do not break the bank. Great wines are easy; you can look them up, but the lesser-priced offerings, sometimes from unfamiliar varietals and out-of-the-way places, that speak to the winemaker’s art rather than focus-group formulae are, for me, the stuff of real excitement as well. Now, I am not saying that I don’t drink an insanely good Napa Cabernet or great Grand Cru Burgundy with a burger (yes, it has happened), but I remember Gamays and Dolcettos, Montepulcianos and Mencias that in their ways were just every bit as satisfying and priced so low that I felt like I was getting away with something.

Of late, Spanish Garnacha (Grenache) has joined Zinfandel (not the swollen, overripe kind), Barbera and Beaujolais as one of my favorite go-to values. The deep, generously fruited Campo de Borja Borsao Garnacha “Tres Picos” at around $15.00 and the slightly lighter Artadi Bodegas y Vinedos Artazu 'Artazuri' Tinto from Navarra, often priced at less than $10.00, are sitting on the kitchen counter now, and both are splendid companions to the Mediterranean-influenced foods and barbecued fare that I like to cook. It is always good to remember the rule that tangy, tomatoey dishes are not sympathetic to puckery, tannin-bound reds. Rich and fruity is fine, chalky and astringent is not.

Just a few days ago, I added a new white to my roster of not-to-be-missed-wines-for-the price, and that is really the point of this morning’s posting. I spent part of a sunny Saturday in Sonoma at the home of a friend and colleague in celebration of a 60th birthday. Now, one of the perks of working with professional chefs is that, when they choose to cook for friends, the cooking is very, very good indeed, and the spread laid before us was deserving of something more than a Coke or cold beer. There were red wines lined up, from Zinfandel to Malbec to Pinot, but the day was warm and a white seemed the thing. My friend eagerly suggested a newly discovered White Grenache from Spain’s Terra Alta, and the vibrant, lightly stony, keenly fruited 2009 Bodegas Abanico Las Colinas Del Ebro Garnacha Blanca at $12.00 proved to be an out and steal that is now at the top of my short list of warm-weather whites.

Happy Birthday, Marco... and thanks for the gift.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
More on High Ripeness—Another Country Heard From

Tue, 10 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

You know how, when you were a kid, that there was always another kid who had something to say about everything. I found that kid and his comments about high ripeness in California wine. He could have been a latter day “low-alcohol acolyte”. Instead, he was the guy whose writing dominated the wine commentary field before R. Parker Jr. came along.

His name was Robert Finigan, and he lived next door to me in college in my sophomore year. I never knew him, of course, because he was a senior, and seniors do not talk to lowly underclassmen. I didn’t discover this amazing bit of coincidence until years later when he was introduced by Tim Mondavi to a room full of writers as “the man”, and his alma mater was dropped in polite conversation. Like all the rest of the writers in the room, I was left to introduce myself to the assembled masses, and I managed to drop the name of the same alma mater into my short public peroration.

Later, “the man” deigned to talk to me, asked me what year I graduated, did not hold my subordinate status against me, and asked me where I lived. “Kirkland B-33”, I responded knowing that this location overlooking the subway yard was not exactly the most sought after room in the joint, and to my surprise, he responded, “I’ll be damned. I lived in Kirkland B-32”.

Mr. Finigan holds a rather important place in my life, although I would never admit it to him at the time since we were competitors in the wine newsletter business. Despite the fact that he lived in San Francisco and was not in the least averse to enjoying good California wine, he seldom wrote about them. As the result, when my wine collecting habit began to get out of control, and reading everything that was written about California wine became part of my passage into wine geek and zealot, Mr. Finigan and everyone else writing ignored my needs.

And thus an idea was borne. Perhaps there were other folks like me around who wanted a more focused publication—one that actually covered the increasingly important California wine scene. Mr. Finigan occupied his high perch for about two decades but gave up the newsletter some time around 1990. But, by then, he had left behind a series of writings that chronicled the times and the changes around him.

I kept all of his writings, or as many as I could lay hands on, since he was writing before I started collecting wine or his writings. And, fate would have it that I was today cleaning out the reams of paper that have collected in my office over these last three and a half decades in order to be able to put more paper into said office. Now, admittedly, Mr. Finigan did not write a blog. He had never heard of a blog in those days, but his writings were not different from what we see in many of today’s blogs.

His comments on ripeness, which run far shorter than this introduction to them, would fit right into the give and take on the subject today. As we used to say on the mean streets where I grew up when the “know it all kid” would interrupt an on-going conversation, “Another country heard from”. Herewith, Mr. Finigan from his newsletter dated March, 1989—

“In reflecting on the progress of the last fifteen years or so, it’s both interesting and useful (Editors Note: Dear Bob, why not say “instructive”) to consider the winemaking process at different points in time. There was the phase of trying to get the grapes as ripe as possible and then to extract the maximum in flavor and color from them, with alcohol levels to match.”

Yesterday’s blog proffered the thesis that the California style of wine had been subject to criticisms about high ripeness for forty years. In coming across Mr. Finigan’s writing from two decades ago, I found confirmation of that thesis. But, I would also point you to the comments section to yesterday’s blog. The brilliant writer, Tom Johnson, checks in with comments along the same vein from a century ago.

I live here near San Francisco for two reasons. It is a lively, intellectually vibrant place that rivals my native Boston, and it has that one virtue that also makes our wines so special—sunshine. Our wines will always be a product of our generous climate. That does not make them better or worse than France or Italy or anywhere else in the world. It makes them different, special and very good. The carping about California wine is very old, much older than I knew, but it will continue as long as there are new generations of wine drinkers who think they have just discovered the “truth”.

Monday Manifestos
The Truth About Overripeness—From 1970 to Now

Mon, 09 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Accusations of rampant overripeness in California wines are not, as some would have you believe, a new phenomenon. It is a festering sore that Euro-palates have picked on for the last forty years.

And for all I know, it goes back way beyond that, but “forty years” represents that limit of my personal time horizon in the wine collecting world. So, for me, this notion, this “red herring” that all California wines are out of control has always been a part of the fabric of wine criticism.

My first recollection of it goes back to the 1970 vintage. It was then that my wine pursuits shifted shape from enthusiasm into serious collection. I experienced the zealout-like rush of the newly converted and bought up everything I could to put into my cellar. The fabulous 1968s were about gone from the market, and while I managed to corral a few of those, it was the 1970s, both Bordelais and Californian, that formed the basis of my cellar then and still represent the largest group of older wines in it today.

Back before the 1976 Paris tasting, when the 1970 California Cabs and their Bordeaux equivalents experienced similarly successful vintages, the wine collecting world was doing side by side comparisons from one end of this country to the other. Those who preferred the French wines pointed accusatory fingers at California excess ripeness even then. “Too fat”, they said. “Too jammy”, they said. “Too obvious”, they said. “Will not age”, they said.

Those were the excuses offered for the large number of victories that wines like Ridge Monte Bello, Heitz Martha’s Vineyard, Chappellet and Mayacamas were extracting from the hidebound backsides of the Europhiles. The difference was not recognized then, as it is not recognized today, as just that—a difference, not a disqualifier.

Some will call it preference. Some will call it prejudice. It matters not. Ultimately, it is an excuse for one set of wines, for one tighter, less generous style. Never mind that the great Bordelais vintages then and now are those in which ripeness comes the easiest. And never mind that the accusation that California wines will not age did not start with the vintages of the late 1990s and early 2000s. It is easy to make excuses based on difference.

So, today, we hear a cry that California wines have become overripe, that they need to return to the days when they were all under 14% alcohol, that today’s wines are too fat, too jammy, too obvious and that they will not age. Certainly, there are wines that fall into those camps. There always have been. Anybody remember that pruney Zinfandels we called Late Harvest, or the fat and fleshy, high pH Pinot Noirs of forty years ago.

But, the rush to brand an entire set of wines as misshapen, to use language like “Napa Cabernets have become a parody of themselves” or “today’s low-alcohol wines are California wine rethought” or branding anyone who would differ with your Euro-palate as “high alcohol apologists” is not only wrong-headed, it is also old hat. And it is the stuff of commentators who simply are not old enough to remember the long and heated debates about the 1970 vintages in Bordeaux and California. Those folks also do not know, because they would otherwise not be so quick to judge, that the 1970 California Cabs won more than their share of the early side-by-side contests, just as they fail to recognize that the California 1970s, now forty years old, have held up far better than their widely heralded counterparts. And they have held up despite accusations of too fat, too obvious, too jammy, won’t age.

Those who forget the lessons of history are bound to repeat it.

Friday Fishwrap
You Know What You Can Do With Your Cult Cabernets

Fri, 06 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I like expensive wines as much as the next guy. I just can't afford them. Some writers get to taste them if they show up at the winery hat in hand and sample the wine with the labels showing and the owner, the winemaker and the family dog in attendance. That's not my style.

Some writers will go to those giant tastings with hundreds of wines being poured, elbow their way to the front of the line for a half ounce pour, taste the wine standing up, knowing what it is and then write about it, complete with score. That's not my style either.

I don't say this lightly, but I don't know of any cult Cabernet that is tasted and evaluated in a comparative blind tasting against its peers. It's hard to blame the wineries. They are at the top of the heap. Why mess with success? It's hard to blame the writers, and their names start with Advocate and Spectator, for doing what they have to do to get access to those otherwise unavailable wines. But before you go admiring those folks for their importance because they bring you reviews of Screaming Eagle and Harlan, of Littorai and Kistler, remember this. No matter how much they or their supporters argue that you can trust those results, you must take them with a grain of salt.

Wine and Food Wednesday
My Balanced Wine Goes With Food—-Does Yours?

Wed, 04 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I’m right and you’re wrong. There are objective and immutable truths about which wines do and do not go with food. Nobody out and out says it, but the message, however implicit and veiled, seems to be just that. Alcohol levels and the ethereal, impossible-to-define notion of “balance” are the watchwords of the day, and have become the rallying cries of those altruistic souls who would save us from ourselves. Among the more damnable sins that a wine can commit, we are increasingly told, is that it is too soft, too fruity and too ripe to be enjoyed with food. It doesn’t matter that it may be tasty on its own, but foodworthiness is that which is to be most prized.

Now, I must admit that while I enjoy an occasional glass or two without a plate before me. I do, however, find that the marriage of great wine and great food is what excites me most, and the search for the same is the greatest pleasure of all. All the same, I am perplexed by the oft-heard claims that a wine that cannot be enjoyed on its own can suddenly be made beautiful when teamed with this or that meal; that there are wines that are only good for drinking on their own and others that are good only if drunk with food. In my book, good wine is good wine. A silly notion, perhaps, but one to which I increasingly subscribe.

My latest musings were triggered by a comment by Dan Berger regarding the red Loire wines about which I wrote last week. “The wines all were relatively crisp, light, and aimed at the dinner table. Indeed, before the food arrived, we appreciated the lovely aromas, but the wines weren’t fun to consume. Food, however, transformed them. And a key was that most of them were about 12.5 percent alcohol, roughly 2-4 points below most New World wines.” http://napavalleyregister.com/lifestyles/food-and-cooking/wine/columnists/dan-berger/article_87e05492-6ca3-11e0-b4e0-001cc4c002e0.html

Ah yes, the old alcohol bugaboo was again the point, but I am going to leave the issues of alcohol, acids, et al alone for the moment and address the curious idea that “wines that were not fun to consume” can be transformed by some immaculate grace of Bacchus and become sensuous delights by service with food.

There is no question this or that dish can help smooth off a wine’s acidy edges, soften the effects of blatant oak or help tame what at first seems to be runaway tannic astringency, and, I do believe that there are food-and-wine unions that can make a good wine look bad, but a bad wine, I think, will still be bad regardless of the tempering effects of food. At the dinner in question, the wines that tasted good with dinner tasted good on their own, and those that seemed thin when sipped by themselves were similarly thin when matched up with food. What lies at a fine wine’s heart, be it an expression of ripe fruit or place, must, it seems to me, be apparent and constant regardless of whether enjoyed alone or matched with an appropriate food.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
How A Californian Was Blindsided by New York Riesling

Tue, 03 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

We Californian wine folk can be a prickly bunch. We argue about terroir, about ripeness, about oak. You name it and we have several positions on the all sides of the issue. But somehow, when it comes to Riesling, we are mostly silent.

Oh sure, there are Riesling proponents here and there. My good buddy Dan Berger has championed the grape, but even though he has legions of followers, his love of Riesling has not produced much reaction here. This is Chardonnay and Cabernet country, and while we are also becoming Pinot Noir territory, which does suggest that we can grow cold-loving grapes like Riesling, we are simply not doing much with the grape.

Those of us, and I am one, who find a well-made, fragrant, balanced, and yes, somewhat sweet Riesling to be just the ticket as an aperitif and with a variety of dishes, have turned to Germany and lately to the few Washington State Rieslings that trickle their ways into our golden climes. And now, there is another source, and one which comes closer to the light and elegant stylings from Germany than anything we have seen here on the left coast.

I refer, as the title of the piece would suggest, to Finger Lakes Rieslings, from upstate New York. In the Connoisseurs’ Guide coverage of the grape last year, we were lucky enough to be able to bring in the Rieslings of half a dozen producers and were very impressed by their quality.

And just this week came more reminders. At dinner on Saturday night, we chose a glass of Riesling from New York’s Red Tail Ridge as a solo sipper while looking at the menu. Admittedly, I choose it because I was surprised to see a New York wine on a San Francisco wine list, but there it was, and I have liked Finger Lakes Riesling. The wine list did not note that the wine was fairly sweet, and, frankly, it should have because sweetness, far more than alcohol level, does influence how one wants to use a wine. In this case, I would have chosen it anyhow, but had the list noted that the wine is also labeled “Semi-Sweet”, I am guessing that it would have received far less play than it did.

But here is where labeling and numbers simply do not help. Absent some discussion of balance, and a way for wineries to somehow indicate how a wine actually presents itself, “sweet” is still a dirty word in the wine world. That this wine labeled “Semi-Sweet” was so blessed with acidity that it achieved brilliance balance both as a bright, perky aperitif and also as an accompaniment, in the second glass ordered, with a pork chop grilled with a light sweet glaze on top.

And here is where Best of Blogs comes in. Yesterday, I was perusing some of my favorite websites and came across an article on Palate Press entitled “Nine New York Wineries To Watch”. Not only do I have a New York City brother whose summer place is out on Long Island in the midst of that area’s growing wine country, but I have just had a most delicious upstate Riesling. To my pleasant surprise, there was Red Tail Ridge right smack dab in the middle of the essay by Lenn Thompson, one of the voices behind the very good blog, New York Cork Report. So, now not only do I have a new winery to follow, but I also have a very good primer on a New Yorker’s thoughts about other good wineries.

Monday Manifestos
The Industry Strikes Back Hard At The Wine Writers

Mon, 02 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken, 39

I received the following by email, sent anonymously, by someone who is obviously very young. I suspect that the wine world is on the verge of its own birth certificate kerfluffle.

==============

Recently, much ado has been made recently in the wine-world with regards to the printing of numbers.

No, this is not yet another critique of the 100 point rating scale. So many have already expressed scathing derision of the idea that the quality of a wine can be captured by a single, numerical expression that any more would be piling on. Rather, the current fuss revolves around the printing of another number, one apparently that does contain within its very nature the ability to differentiate between fine wine and base drink, between that which provides worth companion to a meal and that which is designed for mere intoxication and inevitably leads to great drunkenness and the downfall of all that has made wine worthy over the centuries. That number is, of course, the printing of the alcohol percentage of a wine alongside the review of said wine.

It is hardly necessary for me to tell you how meaningful it will be to your wine-drinking life to have these numbers printed next to the wine reviews. Jon Bonne, of the San Francisco Chronicle, wrote about his decision to print alcohol levels alongside the wine reviews with such fanfare that it was (rightfully, of course, and done because Jon says the readers that comment on his stories – or as he called them via twitter “cranky Gatefolk” -want this information) deemed worthy of the cover story of the Food and Wine Section.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/04/24/FD311J4I7H.DTL&type=wine

Decanter Magazine, England’s leading wine publication (and the self-proclaimed “World’s Best Wine Magazine”), has decided to do the same,

http://www.decanter.com/news/wine-news/524024/decanter-magazine-to-list-alcohol-level-as-standard

While many others, Steve Heimoff of Wine Enthusiast (in his blog www.steveheimoff.com) and Mike Dunne is his online column for the Sacramento Bee (http://www.sacbee.com/dunne_picks/index.html) amongst the group, have chosen to print alcohol levels without the release of a press release. Thus far the Wine Advocate, Wine Spectator, Connoisseurs’ Guide to California Wine, International Wine Cellar, and Burghound have eschewed the printing of such numbers and somehow survived unscathed from the resulting consumer outrage (though there have been some rumors that Robert Parker’s retirement from reviewing California wines was brought about because of the mobs of irate consumers at his Meadowood hotel room, complete with flaming bottles of cult Cabernet on stick).

Despite these holdouts, the course of the future seems to be clear, alcohol levels will be printed alongside each review in all major wine publications. This can only be a good thing and will have the added benefit of eliminating any wine writer responsibility for actually describing whether or not the aforementioned alcohol actually stands out in the wine (rejoinders of “we told you what the number was” shall soon follow). Ultimately, of course, one can only hope that such numbers will replace all descriptive prose, leading each of us to the promised land where:

14.7, 3.8, .52, 70%

will let us know that this is a wine to be avoided at all costs unless your desire is to achieve immediate inebriation and perhaps even endanger the life of all those around you while:

13.2, 3.4, .65, 15%

will provide you with a wine perfectly fit for your Jidori Hen Egg “Aux Fine Herbes, Griddled Brioche, Black Truffle, and Prosciutto. (What? Is your Jidori chicken egg actually from an American raised, Jidori-style chicken? For shame....try 13.5, 3.6, .61, 33%).

However, until that blessed day is upon us when all wines can be evaluated solely by their numbers, it seems that we have arrived at the point where printed alcohol numbers will accompany many wine reviews. With this being settled, now it is time to focus our efforts on the printing of another, even more important, number. Let us all gather our voices in favor of printing the age of the wine writer alongside each of his or her reviews.

Yes, it is imperative now that each wine review carry with it the age of the wine reviewer. In the huge National Geographic Study focusing on over 1 million respondents, it was determined that there are major changes in the verbal characterization of odors as the respondents aged (check out the summary of the report here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8473697?ordinalpos=7&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum). There are many findings contained within this report, including a lack of consensus on certain odors as the respondents aged, major changes in the recognition and description of certain odors as respondents entered the sixth decade of life, and increasing variability in the ability to distinguish sweet odors with the progression of age.

Certainly, the ability to smell a wine and describe its various smells is of paramount importance to a successful wine writer, perhaps even more so than the ability to taste (though this, too, changes with age) and yet we are being asked to trust wine reviews without each wine review having the reviewers age listed next to the review!

Oh, certainly there are other attributes of a trusted wine reviewer (their curriculum vitae, their overall knowledge of wine and the great wines of the world, their consistency over time, how your palate aligns with theirs, etc), but much like the ancillary attributes of a fine wine (such as pH, TA, oak aging, VA levels, brett levels, much less any characteristics of the vineyard in which the grapes were grown), these can be overlooked in favor of printing only one number, the reviewer’s age!

Imagine the confidence with which you will be able to purchase a wine when you see “JB, 38” knowing that his sense of smell is still keen, as he is in his youth, and that his evaluation must be spot on. Even better, calculate the money you will save when you see a review of a wine that sounds fantastic, and yet you know not to purchase it because it says “BH, 56” at the conclusion of the text.

So, yes, it is time as consumers to raise our voices and strike while the Zin is hot, and call for the printing of this vital number!

Friday Fishwrap
What Am I Drinking For The Royal Wedding?

Fri, 29 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

As I write this column, it is just past midnight and like so many Americans, I am amazed that I am watching a wedding in Olde Blighty. Now, this is perhaps not as strange as it seems since my wife and leader is English. And because this is a royal wedding, I have pulled out all the stops and we will be celebrating with a nice bottle of bubbly. I wish I could say it was English bubbly, but that commodity is rarer on the west coast of these United States than 12% alcohol Zinfandels.

Word has it that the royals themselves will be drinking English sparkling wine, and, because there is an English version of the bubbly that actually bested some Champers at a tasting in England (naturally), it is possible that the wine will be more than passable. I certainly hope so for their sakes.

As for the Olkens, we will pull out something from across the channel. Champagne is closer to Jolly Olde than California after all, and it just so happens that Bolly rhymes with "brolly", so Bob's your uncle and it is Bolly for us. I did have to ask Mrs. Olken not to prepare a standard English breakfast, however. As much as i like my eggs and rasher of bacon or ham, I am not overly fond of baked beans and broiled tomatoes or fried bread for breakfast. This is California and we eat dry wheat toast, thank you very much.

Sometime later this morning, I will need to catch 40 winks because, wedding or not, I have a wine tasting in the afternoon and those Pinot Noirs will taste better after a bit of shuteye. Still, good wife or not, I kind of like the idea of the future King marrying a woman whose family is but a generation removed from the coal mines. There is something sort of American about that. Kind of like having a black President with a birth certificate.

OK, no politics. That was a joke. So, good luck to Will and Kate. I will be drinking better bubbles than they will be.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Blogs That Are Fun To Read—Because I Am Tired of Talking About Alcohol

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Someone scary once said, “Words mean what I want them to mean”. I may not have gone that far with the title of today’s outpouring, but this column is not about Heimoff or Work or Dugan or Yarrow or any of the other folks whose serious commentaries are required reading. This is about places I visit one in while when I want to have some fun in the wine blogosphere.

You know what fun is. You just put your lips together and . . . . . no, that is something else again. I mean good old fashion fun, the kind that makes you smile as if you did not have a care in the world. We do too little of that in the wine biz. It’s just that what we drink is serious business. Happily, there are place to go that are fun.

Sara In Le Petit Village

Admittedly, I don’t pop in here all that often, but today, I was looking for something to lighten the mood and there was Sara with an entry called “They Do Things Differently” (http://sarainlepetitvillage.blogspot.com/). It’s short, will take you as long to get there via computer as it will to read entry but do go. It made me smile, and it should do the same for you unless you have been drinking too much of that vile over-14% wine.

Louisville Juice

You may have heard of this blog. I have mentioned it several times. Raise your hands if you have not been paying attention. Sara’s blog is “cute”. This blog is laugh out loud funny. Sure, the guy does get serious now and then. This is the wine business after all, but do go have a read of his essay, “Wine Made Simple: A Modest Proposal” (http://excellentproj.com/) . I promise you that you will laugh out loud. If you don’t, I have some of that over 14% hooch that will get you buzzed and laughter will come easier.

The Hosemaster of Wine

There has been nothing new posted on this site (http://www.hosemasterofwine.blogspot.com/) for nine months. That does not matter. If you are not familiar with The Hosemaster, you need to be. Most of what is there is priceless and timeless like his essays on grape varieties that give us an insider’s view that most of us, even other writers, winemakers and sommeliers did not know. Such as,

Albarino belongs in the category of aromatic grapes along with Gewurztraminer, Muscat, Viognier and Jessica Alba, for whom it is named.
Re Pinot Noir: In Italy it's called Pinot Nero because Italians like to fiddle with it.
Wine Myths: Critics Can Actually Taste All The Things They Describe: There's a pretty simple mathematical way to understand how this works. Take the number of adjectives the critic uses--raspberries, green Gummy bears, pain grille, pommes frites, old Summer's Eve--subtract it from the numerical score, divide it by the alcohol content of the wine.

Wine-Life.co.uk

Yes, when it comes to naming his blog, Oliver Styles has done us the equivalent of calling his winery, Winery. The blog and URL are one and the same. Now, Mr. Styles is no humorist in the way that Tom Johnson (Louisville Juice) or Ron Washam (The Hosemaster) are. He is an Englishman, and he has that wry, ironic sense of humor that so endears us to the English. His latest essay is a critical post about how prices get set in Bordeaux. I loved it, although I will admit that one has to pay a lot more attention to Mr. Styles to get the laugh lines than to Tom Johnson or Ron Washam.

http://wine-life.co.uk/

Wine and Food Wednesday
Loire Reds—-Vive la Difference

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A couple of weeks back, we sat down to a decidedly meaty meal and worked our ways through a number of lighter red wines from France’s Loire Valley, and, while blinding epiphany was hardly the result, there were plenty of pleasant surprises of a more quiet type.

Hosted by the Loire Valley Wine Bureau at San Francisco’s Café Des Amis, and directed by bureau-spokesperson, Jessica Engle, the event aimed to bring a bit of attention to the oft-overlooked red wines of a region principally praised for its whites. Yes, the Loire Valley makes a fair bit of red wine from varietals ranging from Gamay to Pinot Noir to Malbec and Cabernet Franc. They are, for the most part, cast in a somewhat lighter style than those of the Côtes d’Or, Bordeaux and California, et al, and, while not on the big and bold side, they nonetheless proved to be fine companions to a succession of fairly full-flavored dishes this evening.

The simple fact that they are “lighter” and less obviously ripe is enough, I suspect, to win high praise from those conspiracy-obsessed critics of richer wines (yawn) who seek new recruits for their “counter-trend” movement, but these wines were interesting because they have character as well. Not all were successful, and, for me the fresh and aromatic Pinots seemed a bit thin and drawn on the palate. More appealing and downright delicious with both a tasty prime-rib carpaccio and roasted squab, several bottlings of Gamay hit the mark with the juicy, well-filled 2009 Gamay de Touraine “Le Bois Jacou” from Jean-Francois Merieau and the rather more substantial 2009 Vinifera Gamay de Touraine Henry Marionnet being favorites.

Several Cabernet Francs followed as partners to a rare loin of lamb, and, while deeper and weightier as the grape predicts, they too showed a certain aromatic freshness that set them apart. The nervy, herb-scented 2008 Chinon Vielles Vignes Pithon-Paillé and slightly richer 2009 Saumur-Champigny Domaine Roches Nueves are fine cameos of Loire’s way with the grape, and the 2005 Chinon Clos du Chênes Vert from what many (yours truly included) regard as Chinon’s finest producer, Charles Jouget, stood out as the deepest and most complex of the lot with plenty of dark fruit laced with subtle shadings of spice and herbs.

If, in fact, the evening was meant to show off just how tasty these Loire Reds could be at the entrée table, then it should be tagged as a success. It is also worth noting that as a group the wine’s afforded outstanding value, and but for Jouget’s single-vineyard offering which is priced at a very reasonable $35.00, most all of the evening’s wine were $20.00 or less at retail.

More than a few of those attending made the comment that the wines, while wonderfully aromatic, were a bit stiff for solo sipping and showed their best when paired with food. That might be the case with the leaner Pinots and more structured Cabernet Francs, but the Gamays invite drinking with or without food, and I must admit that I continued to sip Jouget’s involving Clos du Chênes long after the plates were cleared.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
SF Chron and Alcohol—Time For The Truth To Come Out

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

When a can of worms gets opened up, it is often hard to put creepy, crawlers back in—and that is what I hope will have happened here. Despite a solid effort on Sunday, the Chronicle article leaves more questions unanswered than answered. Try these on for size. This debate needs more airing, more light, more time and attention.

If one is going to test a bunch of wines, would it not have been better to test a representative sample of wines around the world to establish some kind of basis for future conversation. By testing only 19 wines, and why 19 for goodness sake, the Chronicle article simply begs for more and more testing so that we can know the truth about Chateauneuf, Brunello, Barossa Shiraz, Corton-Charlemagne, Silex, Amarone, Barolo, Chateau Pavie-Maquin.
The Chronicle is going to report alcohol statements from labels in its wine reviews, but it clearly has established that those statements, while within legal limits, are misleading at least half the time. Will this kind of reporting ultimately lead to more testing? Should it?
What master is being served by reporting stated alcohol? Is it the anti-alcohol forces? Is it the folks who get drunk too easily? Is it the anti-California army who started all this in the first place?
If stated alcohol is so important, why has the Chronicle not complained loudly and bitterly that such label statements are notoriously hard to read. Indeed, why has Connoisseurs’ Guide nto complained until now. Most are in tiny print and appear sideways on the labels, often in light type despite the requirement that they be in contrasting type. The wineries, with the collusion of our Government, are hiding alcohol statements more often than not. If this is such a big deal, then making the statement visible and legible is also a big deal. CGCW is now complaining. Will the anti-high alcohol folks follow suit?
It is time to examine the words of Raj Parr as quoted by the Chronicle. This famous sommelier, this brilliant winetaster has perpetuated the big misdirection about alcohol in wine. His comment that he wants to be able to drink two, three glasses and not get drunk may ring true enough, but its basis is pure nonsense. Parr is a self-confessed Red Burgundy fan. He knows that those wines, at the quality level he drinks, run around 13% with many much higher. The legal limit for such wines in 14.5%, but there are anecdotal reports that many of them exceed that limit. But let’s just go with 13%. Compare that to California Pinots that typically run around 14% to 14.5%. Parr says “I never said that there was anything wrong with that other style”. What style is that? 14.5%? The implication of his words are that he can drink three glasses of wine at 13% but less than two at 14.5%. Do the math, folks. This notion that you need to drink 13% alcohol wines or you will get falling down drunk is an intentional falsehood because it keeps getting repeated like some kind of mantra. It is pure poppycock.
Do the math. The difference at a half bottle of wine on the evening is one ounce. It would take 13 glasses of wine before you would need to pass one up to save on the alcohol. The Chronicle article, because it does not take on this nonsense directly, allows it to stand. It is the spoiler in a discussion that is otherwise reasonably without bias.
One final disclaimer. No one at any level is in favor of inebriation. But the concept of inebriation keeps getting drawn like a gun at the OK Corral as if the difference of one to one and half points of alcohol were going to make a difference. Do not drink to excess, please, but also do not stop drinking what you like because of misleading statements that lack fairness and, more importantly, are based on falsehoods. Know your limits, and if you like 14% alcohol Pinots, and you are worried about inebriation, drink one ounce less at the end of the evening.
CGCW, and I personally, applaud the Chronicle for opening up the can. Now it is time to discuss all the worms fairly, openly and without bias.

Monday Manifestos
The San Francisco Chronicle and The Alcohol Controversy

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Was the Chronicle's Sunday article an exposé or a red herring? Were its thousands of words illustrative and thoughtful or another in the long string of jeremiads about the style of wine that is accused of spoiling just about everything that gets produced here?

I will admit that I feared it would turn out to be the latter. The Chron often refers to overdone California wines. But, upon reading the whole article and not just its titillating intro, it is clear that the article does a good job of laying out the stakes and justifying the choice the paper has made to include alcohol levels in all recommendations.

There is a couple of areas in the article that I find very misleading, however. The first is the suggestion that modest differences in alcohol level have a lot to do with how much wine a person can or should drink to maintain an acceptable level of sobriety. There is no argument to be made that the difference between a Riesling at 9% and Zinfandel at 16% is significant. But, the more likely comparison is between a more moderate red at 13% or so and a balanced wine at 14.7%, which is at the relatively high end of the normal range. In that comparison, and assuming that a person would drink a half bottle of wine, the difference in equal levels of blood alcohol comes to about one to one and a half ounces.

The Chron has done a real service in testing a bunch of wines to see how accurate their label statements really are, and it found that most of the stated alcohols in its sample of 19 wines were understated on the label. Most however were at or very near a difference of ½ of 1%, and the Chron and Connoisseurs’ Guide, both of whom have now called for tighter range limits on the required alcohol statement than the 1 to 1½ leeway currently allowed, accept that a ½ of 1% range is about as tight as the regulations can reasonably become. My problem is not that the Chron tested a bunch of wines. Good for them. It is a task long overdue. Rather, I worry about the wines it chose to test. While I can applaud the choice of French and California Sauvignon Blancs each with stated alcohols of 13%, it is harder to be happy with California Chards in excess of 14% without comparable French wines. The same is true of Pinot Noir where every one of the California wines carried stated alcohols over 14% while the one French sample, and cheap one at that, carries a listed alcohol of 12.5%. It was seemingly not intentional, but the implication is that California wines are simply higher in alcohol for those varieties. That may be true, but perhaps not so true that more apt comparisons could not have been chosen.

Every article that takes on a controversial subject is going to find itself held up to scrutiny. The Chronicle article is no different, but it does deserve to be complemented again for a mostly evenhanded and unbiased laying out of the situation. High alcohol is a legitimate concern, but it should not be turned into a standard of judgment. The Chron earns high marks for presenting the view of winemakers who make wines that some would judge as very high in alcohol but whose wines are also generally well-balanced. It is balance, not stated alcohol, that determines how a wine tastes. And one final kudo to the Chron. It also reported that alcohol measurements using several existing techniques can yield varying results.

So, what have we in this long and involved article? To be sure, it does have a tilt towards lower alcohol levels, but that tilt does not attempt to disqualify wines over 14% in the manner that some have tried to do lately. And more than that, this is more of an article about science than organoleptic evaluation, and, as such, it does have plenty of grist for the continue millings of the alcohol in wine arguments. It is well worth a read. The article is available online at http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/. Scroll down to the “Food” and find it there.

Friday Fishwrap
On The Passing of Jess Jackson

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Jess Jackson, the founder of Kendall-Jackson, who wound up being so much more to the California wine business than simply another supplier of inexpensive wine by the oceanful, passed away the other day. You will find tributes to Mr. Jackson in every corner of the wine community. Here is a brief appreciation of his importance that we posted on Steve Heimoff’s (steveheimoff.com) very long and complete essay.

When one thinks of all the energy and funding that has gone into the CA wine business over the last forty years, Jess Jackson, more than anybody else, carved out the biggest niche during that time. His place in history will rank alongside the Gallos and Robert Mondavi. His commitment to vineyard land was established by his becoming the single largest holder of grape-growing property in California. He may ultimately be more remembered for oceans of Vintner's Reserves, but his Highland Series wines, his Verite label and his Jackson Park Merlots were and will be important members of the high-end trade as well.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
The Report Card: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly In The Blogosphere

Thu, 21 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It may surprise you to learn that not everything published in the blogosphere is interesting or well-written or even accurate. It is the job of The Report Card to search out the good, the bad and the ugly and to report it to you.

The Good
Let’s start, because we are in a jolly mood, with the very good. That would be Samantha Dugan’s latest offerings on what has to be the finest creative writing in the wine blog space on her Samantha Sans Dosage. Sam has once again taken on Food & Wine Magazine for its “unusual” suggestion that one choose a very expensive bottle of wine to cook down for a sauce. In knee-slapping good-fashion as only Sam can, she has splayed, filleted and hopefully dismayed the author of that suggestion. It is damned good reading, and we highly recommend her essay, “At It Again” to you. http://sansdosage.blogspot.com

Grade: A

The Bad
Blame Clint Eastwood. He is responsible for the title of today’s blog. The “Bad” here is not all that bad. It just rubs me the wrong way. And maybe part of it is sour grapes, but for whatever reason, I shuddered a bit at the report on the Steve Heimoff blog of his Earth Day luncheon with millionaires. Do I really care if Ted Turner is taciturn or if Gorden Getty is getting groggy with age or if J. C. Boisset is debonair? At least Boisset is in the wine biz, and not only does he have his own wineries, but he has married Gina Gallo, and that cannot be all bad for his vinous fortune. Still, I was not invited to hobnob with these paragons of plenitude, and Steve was, and by a winery that no longer will allow us to taste its wines because we do not give them the “right scores”. Sour grapes? Yeh, probably.

Grade: C for Steve for name-dropping and C- for me for complaining about it.

The Ugly
I could probably have looked no further than Food & Wine for the ugly, but I will leave that telling to Samantha Sans Dosage. Here is a somewhat less egregious but unfortunate bit of wine writing—or what passes for wine writing. So, snob that I am, I just cringed (which is worse than shuddering) at the following comment in a blog that purports to be professional.

The Mano A Vino blog has this comment, and it does no one any harm in reality, which makes it far less dangerous than the Food & Wine foolishness, but it does show that one has to take the blogosphere with a bit of distance at times. All you read is not golden.

“I never knew this, but I recently learned from some friends visiting from the UK that they call Champagne "Champers" over there.”

Grade: Oh, why bother?

Wine and Food Wednesday
Bring Back Half Bottles—Save Me From Myself

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Bring back half-bottles, please! Give the half-bottle format a second chance. I want to drink more than one wine with dinner. I am weary of “by the glass” programs with over-inflated prices for wines that the restaurants buy on special deals so they can gouge me. Bring back the half bottle.

I know that half-bottles mean extra work on the part of producers, but the nominal increase in cost that a change in labels, bottling and packaging is something I would pay without complaint. I know that a wine list well-stocked with half-bottle choices might require a little more inventory management and could reduce a restaurant’s by-the-glass sales, wine profits would not dip for eateries other than those that consider single-glass servings a license to steal.

The topic came up over a late dinner last night. We were tasting back through a series of new Roussannes and Mourvedres for an upcoming issue of CGCW when one of our regular panelists, a winemaker himself, lamented the absence of half-bottle choices, and it was if the light bulb of recognition clicked on over each of heads at the same time. We all reacted as one in our enthusiasm for 375 ml bottlings and in our disappointment that there are far too few of them on restaurant lists. Now, the winemaker in question does not presently bottle wine in smaller formats and so has no particular business agenda nor personal axe to grind. He simply likes the half-bottle size and thinks it makes sense, and so do we. He did offer, however, that when the idea has been presented to restaurant clients, it is more often than not defensively dismissed as a threat. Too bad.

I have long thought that the half-bottle was the perfect thing for restaurant service. When checking out a new list, the first page I look for and too infrequently find is that listing half-bottle choices, and I am excited on the rare occasion that there is actually more than one. Now, don’t get me wrong; I strongly support responsible wine-by-the-glass programs, especially when I feel like experimenting, but with half-bottles, I do not have to worry about how long the wine had been opened and whether it has been subsequently well stored. My significant other and I can comfortably work our ways through two half-bottles for dinner without need for a second mortgage and without worry about driving home impaired. I like the notion of getting a couple of true 6-ounce pours as well, and, while I do not feel chronically short-changed by wine-by-the-glass portions, I cannot say that disappointment is rare.

I cannot say that I expect the situation to change any time soon, that there will be some sudden upwelling of interest and demand for half-bottles. I will buy and enjoy my share of wine by the glass, but I will keep looking for those half-bottles, and I will let the folks who make them and sell them know that they are appreciated by buying them.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Words Matter Most—Ratings Rate Second

Tue, 19 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There is a debate on the Heimoff blog about tasting notes, and it took the usual turn into treating tasting notes as if they were numbers instead of words. Here is my take, as posted just minutes ago, on that blog.

“I have been thinking about the MJ comments to David Cole and was going to respond this AM. Kathy has beaten me to the punch, but not fully covered the whole topic.

The reason why David Cole’s description of wine sounds like a tasting note is because it is a tasting note. One cannot talk about an individual wine without writing a tasting note. Even the vaunted Gerald Asher writes tasting notes even as he tells us that he decries the tasting note. He cannot help himself. It is how wine commentary is done. The ratings that accompany tasting notes are NOT the note. Mr. Cole’s writing, whether one thinks of it as hyperbolic or brutally honest, needs no score or rating or symbolic notation because it is a single, standalone description offered for commercial purposes. He makes wine to sell. He must describe his wines to sell them. And he cannot, attach scores to them by himself. Not because they replace his words, but because it would seem even more self-serving than his tasting note.

Steve Heimoff and the rest of us who describe thousands of wines for a living also write tasting notes. The symbolic notation we attach is nothing more or less than that. It is the words that count first and foremost, and those words are tasting notes.

David Cole writes tasting notes. He can say it is not about the scores and he is right. It is about the words. That is the point that MJ has made so eloquently. It is about the words. If it were not, Steve and I would review five times more wine, put down a number and move on. The number would be the simplest shorthand for the judgment we are making, and it would not change that judgment, but it would drive us into a different profession because criticism would no longer be about the love of great wine but the love of great numbers.

Kathy, your fantasies miss the point. The reason why Steve Heimoff, Charlie Olken, Jim Laube, Robert Parker, Steve Tanzer and all the rest of the critics write the words is because it is about the words. David Cole misses that point as well, but I suspect that he likes his own words a lot more than he would like Steve’s or mine.

I encourage you and David and everyone else to criticize the hell out of the misuse of ratings, but do not mistake the trees for the forest. The ratings are just a few leaves. Words matter. Words make the difference. That is why David Cole uses them, why Kathy wants them. And words are what most critics supply and most consumers use to decide on the wines they are going to buy. They cannot buy by points alone because too many wines get positive reviews. Ultimately, unless we think that consumers are dummies, and I do not, consumers buy wines, not points. And wines are describhed by words for me, for Steve, for David Cole and most of the world.”

Monday Manifestos
Taste The Wine, Dammit, Then Make The Call

Mon, 18 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

What ever happened to talking about wine? Real bottles, not styles…and one bottle a time. What happened to thoughtful and informed tasting, i.e., bonafide empirical study? These days, the stuff that really gets discussion stirring is not about a given wine being right, as much as it is about all wines in a style or from a particular place being wrong.

Every so often, we all stop and think about what it is that we do and why we do it. Here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, we write about wines. We think a good deal about what it is that we do, about the craft we have chosen and the responsibility it brings, and just what it means to be a wine writer and critic. We think and regularly talk among ourselves about what wine writing is, was and likely will be in a wildly changing future that is increasingly about tomorrow more than next year or even next week. And, there is no question that like everyone else in the writing game, we think about the impact that the internet has had on professional journalism.

The complaints, questions and threats to hitherto safe sinecures are now so routine as to be yesterday’s’news, and continued debate seems increasingly driven by defense of either the status quo or the new electronic democracy (anarchy?) that claims there are no experts…or that everyone is. Egad, how many times have I heard the claims, both joyous and rife with sad lament, that professional print journalism is dying. Maybe yes, maybe no. Darwin’s perspectives are as valid in the way of social circumstance as in the realm of DNA, but I would argue that if print journalism may be getting a bit gray at the temples, genuine professional journalism is not about to disappear any time soon. It is, however, in the process of changing.

Now, I cannot speak for sportswriting, political commentary or business analysis, but as far as our little corner of the journalistic world of winewriting goes, one of the fairly significant changes, it seems to me, is the degree to which contentiousness and negativity has become de rigeur. All too often, the stuff that really gets discussion stirring, both in print and especially online, is not about a given wine being right, as much as it is about all wines in a style or from a particular place being wrong. The editorial waters have become so roiled that some professional wine scribes cannot deign a wine or wines worthy without taking a shot at those that are not. Conspiracy theories and warnings of secret cabals abound. Damnation, we are told, awaits the sinister secret societies that have mortgaged their souls and would sacrifice ours on the alter of “manipulative” winemaking. The path to hell is clear and is paved by the heresies of megapurple, reverse osmosis, spinning cones, acid-adjustment, overripeness, alcohols higher than some “proper” percent and the painted jezebel of far too much expensive French oak…and the responsible writer’s calling is to crucify those that embrace them and their “fellow travelers” now.

Quick litmus tests as to alcoholic content, pH, blending and the like strike me as uninformed shortcuts that ignore the single most fascinating thing that I have ever learned from wine, and that is that each has its own immutable voice and a story to tell to anyone willing to listen. Some wines will inspire, and some might serve as soporifics, but you cannot know which it might be until the cork is pulled and a glass is poured. Perhaps, I have become too conservative, or maybe even reactionary in my old age, but I hold stiff-fingeredly true to the notion that opinion worth paying attention to must derive from some kind of calm and objective base, as far as the latter can be achieved. In other words, do the work…and do it over and over again.

Yeah, I am old school in that I believe in blind tasting and in the crafting of tasting notes. I think that the professional wordsmith can indeed meaningfully communicate more about a wine than that it is sweet or savory. To argue other, it seems to me, is the same as limiting a review of the opera as being quiet or loud, or of the latest museum showing of an old master as being blue or green. I believe that there are good wines and bad wines outside of the subjective realm, but I have for a very long time tasted and studied and sipped my way through most of the world’s fine wine regions, and I have yet to find the very broad brush with which too many folks use to so conveniently paint one family of wine or another into an inescapable corner. I am aware of what I like and what I do not, and there are well-made wines that are simply not my cup of tea. I would like to think that I can describe their character without resorting to a sneer and interjections as to why x, y or z is a nobler, more authentic and worthwhile effort. I will describe those that do not please accordingly. I am in the business of opinion, but I have yet to encounter any wine or wines that speak for all those that share the same provenance or style

At the end of the day, it is about wine…one glass at a time, not about cabals, conspiracies, Old-World enlightenment or the craven New World’s creations of latter-day golden calves. It is only wine after all, and if the really great ones are justifiably referred as art, beauty as always lies in the eye of the beholder. If you see through different lenses than mine, I cannot argue. I suppose I am just asking that you take the time to look and listen. Every bottle has something to say.

Friday Fishwrap
True Confessions—What I Did This Week

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I can admit that I am near the retirement age of my grad school class. Recently the Class Secretary sent out an inquiry to our group asking what our plans were. Retirement? Second career? Trophy wife? Keep on keepin’ on? I responded that I could not imagine retiring from what I do. It is not because it defines me. Rather, it is because I love what I do. I taste wine for a living.

Well, one wag wrote in and commented, “Of course you are not thinking about retiring. You are doing what the rest of us want to do when we retire”. Perhaps that is why so many people, upon being told what I do for a living, respond “I wish I had your job”.

Now, I will admit that I love my job. I love looking for the next great wine. I love visiting wineries here in order to write about them. I love visiting wineries overseas. I doubt I would have ever visited Chile or Argentina or Australia had it not been for my day job. I loved Australia so much I went back on vacation. Of course, we visited a winery here and there. How can one visit Adelaide without spending a day in the Barossa? How can one visit Melbourne without wandering out to the Yarra Valley? How can one visit Sydney—oh, wait, no wineries there. Just museums, vistas and eating and drinking very well.

This week was more of the same, only more so. Weeks like this come along every so often. Four tastings for Connoisseurs Guide, including a review of the top-rated Chardonnays and Viogniers for the May issue. These “final” tastings, when all the good wines get looked at a second time, are simply some of the most fun things we do. Fifteen Chardonnays, and every one a three-star candidate. Most wind up at two stars, of course, because the standards for three stars are so high that we usually only get about 1% of all wines tasted at that exalted level. But, two star wines are very good indeed, and fifteen or so of those all on the table at one time is enough to make us smile with joy.

Okay, so four tastings may be “work”, but they are not really a burden. How about the blog? True confessions time—this blog is not my favorite activity on most days. We have added the blog because the Internet allows us to say a lot more than we ever could in print. And with all of our peers weighing in on the issues of the day, we realize that our readers deserve our views on the goings on in the California wine industry. Hence, the blog. Hope you like it.

Editing—It is the editing that makes this week and the early part of next week so special. This is the time of the month when the next issue gets put together. Steve Eliot and I write the tasting notes. Then they get assembled and go through three editings. I wish I could say that this kind of attention to detail made CGCW letter perfect, but it never seems to work that way. Just yesterday, we got a note from a winery that we had misspelled the name of a vineyard and the wine therefore would not show up when they searched our database for it. Fixing that seemingly minor glitch, of our own making of course, takes time. It is time that goes with the territory, but it surely is not time that sits at the top of my fun list.

But, here’s one. Last night, Steve and I attended a tasting of Loire Valley red wines. These are not mindblowing wines, but with so many other reds in this world now having experienced enormous price inflation, reds like Chinon, Saumur, Touraine still hit the market at prices often under $20. And in the Loire, those reds can be made from Pinot Noir, Gamay (the true Gamay), Cabernet Franc and some other varieties that show up less often like Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec. The wines were interesting enough and only one, a Charles Jouguet Chinon, was over $20. These wines and the better known whites from the Loire are one of the hot new categories in the United States. Price has a lot to do with it, as does the easy, briskly balanced drinkability of these wines.

We may not have learned all that much, but evenings like this, despite the time they take away from family and just plain relaxing, are always worth the effort. For one thing, the wines last night raise the question again, “why cannot California make wines like these”? That is a topic for another time, but it is clear that we only get there by default or mistake and not by intent.

Today will bring more editing. I have to finish up the edits on the Zinfandel section and move on to the Viogniers. Later today, we will be tasting another set of Pinot Noirs for the June issue, and tonight, after the usual Friday night with English mysteries on one of the local PBS stations, I will finish up whatever is left from today’s agenda. The weekend will be busy as well because the Chardonnays need to edited, the Centerfold tasting of older Zins needs to be written and edited, and we need to be ready on Monday to send those pieces off to our graphics firm so they can start the preliminary layout of the May issue even as we are working on the other unfinished business.

By the end of next week, the issue will be ready for the second of three edits, and that will happen over the weekend so that our printer can prepare a press proof on Monday leading to the third and final edit of the issue. If all goes according to Hoyle, the Online edition will go live at midnight on the 30th, the print issue will be coming off the press and be going into the mail shortly thereafter, and we will finally take a day off—unless that next day is one of our regular tasting days. Oh, and did I mention that I am going to slip in a daytime ball game next week on our only non-tasting day?

Yes, it is a tough life, this wine-tasting, but somebody’s got to do it.

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Thrill Will Rise Like A Phoenix

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is time to answer that burning question: what is it in the wine world that is exciting today? I don’t mean only the next great Pinot with a well-cooked lamb chop—although that is excitement enough in its own right. I am talking about “thrill”, as in “wow” and “who knew” and “we’ve just turned another corner, taken another giant step on the road to vinous Nirvana, confounded the conventional wisdom and loved it”.

Lord knows that we have our share of those special moments over the past half century. The rise of Chardonnay from 1960 to today (no measurable acreage to almost 100,000 acres), the discovery that barrel aging our wines and bottling them before they dry out could make some of them into world class, the emergence of new places to grow grapes and the inevitable change in our vinous history, the Paris Tasting of 1976.

Those kinds of excitements are fewer and further between these days, and my writing peer, Steve Heimoff, said as much in his blog today and got pilloried for it. He was mostly right, but he somehow managed to offend a swath of the wine community nonetheless. These are the folks who think that the planting of Trousseau Gris somehow matches the emergence of Chardonnay. These are folks who now think that Randall Grahm has become old before his time. They forget that he is out there exploring new lands and launching an incredible experiment by trying to raise grape vines from seeds in the hopes of finding true varietal character that may have been lost over the years with our rush to virus free vines grafted on top of rootstocks that are not from the same variety.

In the midst of the small debate that broke out on the Heimoff blog, one voice in the wilderness asked the simplest of questions? Hardy Wallace, whose own blog, Dirty South Wine, is smart, inquisitive and willing to break a few eggs, asked of Steve Heimoff, “Steve- What would excite you?”

Nothing more. Five words in all. But so profound that I felt personally challenged even though the comment was not addressed to me. What is in this wine world, after almost four decades of observing and writing, of penning issue after issue of Connoisseurs’ Guide, after writing books that have been in print for almost three decades and were renewed just last fall, that would be truly exciting? What a great question.

Here are five answers. There are likely to be twenty more if I want this essay to turn into a short story.

Item: Discover somewhere in California a large swath of land that will grow Cabernet Sauvignon as well as it grows in the best parts of the Napa Valley. Maybe it does not exist. Maybe it is already covered with houses and factories. Maybe it is just waiting to be discovered. Pinot Noir may be one of the world’s most finicky varieties, but it grows well in many more places than Cabernet Sauvignon at this point.

Item: Rewrite our AVA boundaries so that they mean something to the consumers. Too much of what passes for “territory” is determined by the business interests of the wineries. That is why we have AVAs like Napa Valley, Russian River Valley, Sonoma Coast, Paso Robles that are hard to define because their sheer size spreads too far for specific definition as to the character they can produce.

Item: Rewrite the 21st Amendment to the Constitution in such a way that wine sales follow a set of national rules for distribution and shipping. It is time that the consumers were served by those laws, not the abolitionists and the wholesale and retail segments of the industry. A bad law may have been necessary seventy or eighty years ago. Today, it is totally anachronistic and harms the consumer and the producers while lining the pockets of State governments and the local sales organizations.

Item: A miracle solution to the closure problem. Yes, it is true that corks are much cleaner than they used to be, but the percentage of corked wines is still too high. I happen to like cork—when it works. But when it destroys the 1988 Mouton at our tasting last week or the Coppola Chardonnay in tonight’s tasting, then I like it less. I am no great fan of the screwcap; frankly, they are utterly charmless and their use has led so far to inconsistent results in our tastings. Plastic plugs masquerading as cork are even more charmless, and they have flaws that destroy wine over time. Agglomerated corks (chop them up, sterilize them and glue them back together) may work perfectly well, but they also break more often than do whole corks. In short, there is today, no perfect closure. Thus, I say again, bring on the miracle solution. That will get my vinous juices flowing at full speed.

Item: A great bottle of wine. When Steve Heimoff says that there is less excitement in the wine world today, he, of course, means big deal stuff like the items above. Okay, he’s right. But, frankly Steve, does not a great bottle of wine make everything right? I have been working at this same stand since 1974, and it is still exciting, fun, rewarding, because every time I pull a cork, it just might be the next great wine. And even if it is not, I am happy to drink the good ones like the La Crema Russian River Pinot Noir 2009 we tasted tonight. No matter how you slice it, it is about wine quality, and there is plenty of that around to make anyone’s day.

Monday Manifestos
Dipping A Toe Into 1988 Bordeaux

Mon, 11 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Some time ago, back in my grad school days, I was introduced to really good wine. Today, I might have described those Bordeaux beauties in fancier, more complex, wine-geek terms, but back in the day, it was simply “really good wine”. I returned to those roots last Friday night in the company of a tasting group to which I was invited as a guest. Not a “sing for your supper” guest, mind you, but simply as a friend of a friend.

And in tasting those older wines, now nearing their twenty-fifth birthday, I was reminded why one cellars wines until they get old and have changed their spots. And I was equally reminded that some of them will not make the journey very well even as the majority of these highly renowned wines should certainly have been expected to do.

I am guessing that not many of you have 1988 First Growths in your cellars, and, at least for the time being, I won’t discuss each wine directly. With wines of that age, which no one is going to go out and buy at this point, the lessons have more to do with what one can expect and how those expectations are never fully met.

As a general statement, it is my impression that the bulk of the wines were still more tannic than one would expect and that, despite perfect cellaring and intact corks, nearly half of the wines had begun to dry out. In this I was a little bit surprised because my experience is that California wines of the same age and pedigree are still doing fine at an equivalent age. While there is no universal truth in that declaration, it is, from my perspective as one who drinks a fair bit of older California Cabernets (the fault of having too many in the cellar), reasonable to expect highly regarded wines from top vineyards and producers to stand the test of time.

In part, we are talking about a Bordeaux vintage that has always been a bit of an enigma, but it is not a vintage that was poorly regarded. So perhaps, the greatest lesson is that one cannot judge the vintage and its prospects when it is young. The most pertinent recent California parallel comes in the side by side vintages of 1973 and 1974. With a few notable exceptions, the more highly regarded 1974s faded before the somewhat less highly regarded 1973s. Very few would have made that prediction when the wines were in their youth.

A second parallel between those older California wines and the Bordeaux we tasted the other night is that you never quite know which wines are going to fade. The late Louis M. Martini, in the very first Connoisseurs’ Guide interview ever, told us that he believed there were no great older wines, only great older corks. Even accepting that statement as a bit of hyperbole meant to educate the neophytes that we were back in the early 70s, there is something of a parallel in the mixed rates of maturation of those older Bordeaux. Even though these wines were First Growths, they were mo more consistent than any other set of older wines. And that constant peril for older wines that one has cellared for ages in want of a special occasion reared it ugly head last Friday as well. One wine, the Mouton, was horribly and unremittingly “corked”. It actually showed a bit of rounded fruit underneath the disfiguring mustiness, but it was undrinkable nonetheless. It happens, and that is why we usually have reserve bottlings in reserve when we are tasting older wines.

The other side of the equation, the good side, also was apparent. The favored wine in the tasting, the Cheval Blanc, was both open and sturdy at the same time. It clearly has room to hold for years yet. Only a couple of others were pretty much finished, and, most would at least hold in good condition for a bit as well. The marginal wines may have been curiosities, not great statements of grandeur, but the top wines had found that magical level of depth, vitality, complexity and inner sturdiness that is the reward when a wine has aged the way we want it to age. In that finding, at last Friday night’s tasting, I am reminded again why I have old wines in my cellar. When they are right, they are as special as special gets in wine appreciation. And when they are not, they cost only a few dollars and a bit of electricity.

Friday Fishwrap
Because We Cannot Live By Cult Wines Alone

Fri, 08 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I taste a lot of expensive wine in my day job, and, truth be told, I have a few of those fancy bottles stashed away. But my daily tipple, and your too in all likelihood, is something a lot less pricey. Good wine need not be a financial burden. Let those few great bottles occupy that demanding place in your life. With a little luck and a quick look around the shelves of your favorite retailers, you are bound to come in contact with some of the wines below that hit the Connoisseurs’ Guide BEST BUYS list. The wines are scored on the star-system that has been the basic CGCW rating methodology since our beginnings back some decades ago. There is a lot to like here, and we will back next month with another list of worthies. Any wine rated at two stars or above is likely to be memorable. Those rated lower are probably more suited for everyday drinking, and each of them rates very high on the QPR (Quality to Price Ratio) scale. Enjoy.

ZINFANDEL There was a time when Zinfandel ranked among the front runners when it came to good value, but the pickings have been somewhat slimmer over the last several years. Our recent tastings, however, have uncovered a host of fine wines at very fair prices, and the very rich HANDLEY Redwood Valley 2008 ($20.00), the keenly fruited GIRARD Old Vine Napa Valley 2008 ($24.00) and the weighty, optimally ripened CAROL SHELTON Wild Thing Cox Vineyard 2007 ($24.00) lead the way. Among top offerings, the very deep, slightly chocolaty PEACHY CANYON Westside Paso Robles 2008 ($19.00) and the gregariously fruity WINE GUERILLA Sonoma County 2009 ($15.00) are not to be missed, and the rustic TERRA D’ORO Amador County 2007 ($18.00) wins the nod for its classic expression of Amador fruit. Keep an eye out as well for the very solid McNAB RIDGE Zinzilla 2008 ($13.00), the brisky balanced SOBON ESTATE Cougar Hill Amador County 2008 ($17.00), the very mannerly, well-balanced VALLEY OF THE MOON Sonoma County 2008 ($16.00) and the berry-like WRITER’S BLOCK Lake County 2007 ($13.00) while the BOGLE Old Vine California 2008 ($11.00) is an eye-opening effort with far more fruity substance and depth than its modest price might predict. Finally, if coming up just a shy of full recommendation, the well-defined PEACHY CANYON Incredible Red 2008 ($12.00) and the easy-to-taste RENWOOD Sierra Foothills 2007 ($10.00) are bonafide Best Buys in every sense of the words.

SYRAH California Syrah has its fair share of detractors, but we like the richness that is found in the better examples. The very spicy ZACA MESA Santa Ynez Valley 2006 ($23.00) is a beautifully crafted effort that is nothing short of a bargain, as is the energetic, distinctively varietal 90-point FREY Redwood Valley 2006 ($15.25). The VINA ROBLES Huerhuero Red 4 Paso Robles 2008 ($16.00) is fleshy, fruity and very well-balanced, and the MICHAEL AND DAVID PHILLIPS Incognito Lodi 2008 ($16.00) will find favor with fans of rich, fully ripe, oak-sweetened Syrahs.

PINOT GRIS While the occasional stunner such as the wonderfully rich, highly recommended HAHN Estate Santa Lucia Highlands 2008 ($20.00) comes along, West Coast Pinot Gris/Pinot Grigio is more often a light and engaging quaff that can afford very good value. The blossomy J WINE COMPANY California 2009 ($15.00) is just such a wine, and widely available, 86-point favorites priced at $12.00 and less include the LOREDONA Monterey 2009 ($11.00), the CYCLES GALDIATOR California 2009 ($11.00), the GEYSER PEAK California 2009 ($12.00) and the GNARLY HEAD California 2009 ($11.00)

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
So You Won’t Drink Sweet Wine—Shame On You

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I saw this comment elsewhere yesterday and cringed. “Kudos for contributing to the growing up of palates of the grad school wine club, but an awful lot of consumers still drive demand for fruit and residual sugar”.

Okay, I don’t know all that lies behind that comment. I accept that. And before I go further, I will admit this: Riesling is my favorite white varietal, and I don’t much worry about the sweetness that brings the fruit and acid into balance. I don’t even care if some Chardonnays have residual sugar. The sugar is not the issue. Balance is the issue. I don’t much like sweet Chardonnays, but I could see myself drinking a wine like Rombauer Chardonnay with some Thai and Indian dishes. I prefer Riesling, but the Rombauer is balanced, clean, and goes down easily for me in settings in which I like a little sweetness in my wine.

So, why do people continue to throw brickbats at sweetness and say things that sound like “palates grow up when they forsake sweet wines”? Is it some form of paranoia that makes me think the comment is directed at California wines just like the under-14% alcohol comments also take aim at California wines? Or is it another version of wine snobbism that is saying, “People who drink wines with residual sugar or primary fruit character need to grow up”.

The French drink Sauternes with their fois gras. Other sweet wines work as well in that setting. I have been known to drink Sauternes with salmon napped in a cream sauce, and if truth be known, I cured salmon fillets in sugar and lemon vodka so that they would match up even better with Sauternes at a recent Chez Olken dinner. I used to drink a fair amount of Port after dinner. Now I prefer a lighter wine like a Muscat Beaumes de Venise.

There is nothing wrong with sweet. An element of sweetness in some wines makes them more interesting, not less. A palate is not “mature” because it drinks “dry” wines. Indeed, a palate does not need to be mature at all. All a palate needs to be is in touch with itself, liking what it likes and hopefully leaving itself open to new experiences.

But, I also see a couple of arguments that make that comment too narrow, too arrogant, too much of “my way is the way”. And every time I read or hear things like that in the wine world, I cringe. I am a critic. I tell people my opinion. I don’t tell them what their opinions ought to be.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Why A Good Wine-By-The Glass Program Is Worth The Effort

Wed, 06 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There have been more than a few noisy voices raised against restaurant wine-by-the-glass programs, but I am still a believer. Yes, many such lists are overpriced. Yes, they are an easy way to get rid of wines that are less than stellar, and, yes, some seem assembled by folks who hail from somewhere other than the earth that I know. I have heard all the whines, but I am still a believer. My advocacy may come in part because I remember the days when the choices for a single glass of wine in a restaurant were few... house red, house white and, perhaps, a mix of the two that was passed off as Rosé. Maybe it is because I survived the days of Mateus, Lancer’s and Blue Nun. These wines, we were told by well-produced television commercials, made ideal drinking with every possible food, and I still recall my feelings of betrayal when the light bulb clicked on over my head, and I learned in no uncertain terms that I had been lied to.

Sometimes a single wine will serve well which each course and with every entrée on the table, but there are times when one will not do, and I for one am delighted that there are other options than coughing up the money for another bottle, doing without or settling for a train wreck of uncomplimentary flavors that simply does not taste good. For me, however, the greatest virtue afforded by a good wine-by-the-glass program is the opportunity to experiment with new wines and new food-and-wine combinations.

A recent evening out at San Francisco’s splendid SPQR restaurant drove home the point as we tasted eight wines with the same number of creative, wonderfully flavorful courses that ran from a “Buckwheat Mezze Maniche” with suckling pig ragu, smoked bacon and gold raisins to “Vialone Nano Risotto” made with maine lobster and veal sweetbreads to a show-stopping “Linguini al Cocoa” enriched with broccoli crema, beer-braised pork cheeks and mimolette cheese. The wines, all Italian, included among others a first-rate Sicilian sparkler made from Nerello Mascalese, a rounded, eminently tasty Alto Adige Gewurztraminer, and the single best Teroldego I can recall having tasted. I taste over 5000 wines each year, most in a professional context, but many of the wines and most of the producers were new to me, and, beyond being a gastronomic treat of the first order, dinner was filled with one discovery after another, the likes of which reminded me of why I do what I do for a living.

True, there are wines of which a single glass is not enough, and a full glass of others may prove to be too much, (none of the latter this particular night I am pleased to report), but I am as excited to find new wines and winemakers today as I was when taking my first vinous steps several decades back. A well-managed, carefully conceived wine-by-the-glass program facilitates just such discoveries, and sometimes the search is as much fun as the finding.

Visit SPQR’s website at http://www.spqrsf.com/

Monday Manifestos
In Which I Defend The 100-Point Scale Reluctantly But Vigorously

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I hate the 100-point scale. But I can’t live without it. I love the 100-Point scale because it is easy to use, easy to understand and extends and heightens the meaning of the detailed tasting notes that Steve Eliot and I write for Connoisseurs’ Guide. And, while I hate the 100-point scale for its misuses and abuses, I always defend it because almost all of the criticism of it is overblown, overwrought and emotionally charged.

I blame this essay on my compatriot Blake Gray whose blog, The Gray Market Report, recently explained how he got waylaid into defending the 100-point scale in front of an audience of skeptics. His comments on that event, which he seems to have enjoyed immensely despite having to take a stand that was perhaps more “committed” than he personally is, are contained in his blog entry of March 30, http://wblakegray.blogspot.com/2011/03/running-with-devil-supporting-100-point.html.

His sense of cognitive dissonance, my term not his, is paralleled by mine. And his responses to the criticisms never missed the mark. Still, in reading them over, it is clear that there is more to be said—at least from my point of view, in defense of the 100-point scale, which I hate. Listed below are the major criticisms as Mr. Gray remembers them together with my comments on those criticisms.

Item: White wines don't do as well in ratings as red wines

Nonsense. Of course they do. But it depends on the white wine. High ratings require depth, complexity and grandeur. Plenty of Chardonnays and sparkling wines as well as Sauvignon Blancs, Rieslings, Viogniers and Marsannes and Marsanne/Roussanne blends get very high scores in Connoisseurs’ Guide and elsewhere. But, I will agree that reds score highly in greater percentages because more reds reach the greatness required to score in our three-star/95 points and up range.

The corollary to this argument goes something like: How come there are no 100-point rosés? Simple. As good as good rosé can be, there are none that rise to the level of grandeur. High levels of success—yes, but grandeur—no. If they did, they would not be among the most affordable good drinks in the wine biz. Demand would push their prices up.

Item: There's no real difference between a 91 and a 92

Frank Prial, the legendary winewriter for the New York Times remarked a decade or two ago, at the dawning of the 100-point system, “If a critic scores a wine at 87 points, I know that he or she liked that wine a little more than a wine rated at 86”. For me, that about says it all.

Oh yes, I can agree that it is not likely that all scores could be replicated to the exact level in a retasting. And I will tell you a little secret. Despite double and triple checking, occasionally we have reviewed a wine twice in print. In those half dozen instances, most of the ratings were either the same or one point different. And the descriptions, which are more important than the ratings, were almost identical in direction and in judgment of the makeup of the wine.

But beyond even that anecdotal argument, I will agree that the difference is not great, and what really matters, again, is the tasting note. It is the explanation of what we found and why we have assessed the wine the way we did. And that is the reason why tasting notes in Connoisseurs’ Guide are longer than you will find in any other of the widely read wine publications.

Item: The 100-point scale is really a 15-point scale, because nobody gives ratings under 85 anymore

This criticism is close to being true, but it is not a criticism of the 100-point scale. It is a criticism of the critic. The choice not to criticize wines of less than likeable dimension is based on two assessments: readers do not care about bad wine; they only care about good wine. And, wineries who get criticized for their bad wines will stop supporting the publication in question.

At Connoisseurs’ Guide, we review every wine we taste and tell our readers what we think with no punches pulled. We believe that “the whole story” is our responsibility to the folks who pay our way and let us engage in winetasting for a living. You deserve it all, not just some candy-coated version of our efforts. As the legendary baseball umpire, Bill Klem, said almost a decade ago now, “Out or safe, it ain’t nothin’ until I call it”. Some writers may not want to call the wild pitches. Connoisseurs’ Guide does, and so do some other publications.

Item: The 100-point scale favors "international style" wines: big reds that could be from anywhere

This is another example of utter poppycock. The 100-point scale is certainly applied differently by each writer who uses it, but when writers go around praising Pinot Noir and Sonoma Coast wines and the Cabs of Corison and Spottswood and Ridge, just to name a few of the most obvious and unassailable examples, they are not praising “international” wines. Moreover, the use of the term “international” is meant to suggest, at the first hand, that any wine with oak and expressiveness has lost its way in life. And at the second hand, and this is often the hidden or not so hidden meaning, wines that do not mimic the precise characteristics expressed by wines with similarly composed cepages in Europe.

Here again, the argument against the 100-point scale is nothing more than a red herring for an argument of a different sort. People have been criticizing California Cabs for ripeness for the forty years that I have been collecting, and the arguments have not varied even though the wines here and in Bordeaux have changed over that period. The 100-point scale has nothing to do with those arguments, yet some people will reach for any value-loaded criticism, no matter how relevant or irrelevant it is.

Item: The 100-point scale doesn't recognize terroir

Here I quote Tina Turner: What’s terroir got to do with it? Wine criticism comes first. Judgments about the wine dictate the rating. Terroir is or is not a part of the criteria applied by the critic. The uses of the 100-point system, or of any system of ratings, or of any review whether it has scores or not, all depend on the reviewer, not the system of symbolic notation that gets appended to the review.

Item: The 100-point scale rates wines without food, but wine is supposed to go with food

It would be possible, I suppose, to get into a long discussion of how critics go about reaching their conclusions, but this is a discussion of the 100-point system, and that is nothing about its use that does or does not reach conclusions about wine with or without food. This argument is even more of a red herring than the ones that preceded it. It is the methodology of tasting, not the rating system that determines whether wines are tasted with food or not.

Item: The 100-point scale misleads consumers

Frankly, I don’t get this objection. Even if there is no statistically or organoleptically significant difference between 91 and 92 save for someone’s slight preference, there is no way that stating such a preference is misleading on its face. Wine criticism lives in the world of small differences. When we or any critic comes face to face with a dozen Rutherford Cabernets or seven single-vineyard Zinfandels from Ravenswood, we must make very fine judgments both as to character and as to overall attractiveness. That is our job. That is the job of any critic. Applying a numeric or other symbolic shorthand to the written words does not mislead the consumer. In point of fact, if done right, it makes the meaning and intent of the tasting note clearer.

Item: The 100-point scale hurts wineries

All criticism has the potential to hurt the interests of the producer, whether we are talking wine or cars or theater. That is the nature of critical review. It is supposed to tell the truth as the reviewer sees it. Using the 100-point scale is no more hurtful than the four-star system applied to movies or the grading system used in educational institutions. Judgment is judgment. “This wine tastes and smells bad” is every bit as harmful to a producer as a 75-point rating. Negative commentary is bound to have negative connotations.

But, dear readers, and especially those of you who are winery readers, is not criticism meant for the consumer, and does not the consumer deserve the best, most effectively described criticism that can be offered? Those who argue that the 100-point scale or any scale hurts the wineries, simply miss the point of criticism. It is the view of the critic, and one can criticize the lack of rigor and the lack of standards of some reviewers, but it is wrong-headed, in my humble opinion, to criticize the system of symbolic notation. It simply is not the cause of any of the criticism that was heaped upon it and upon Mr. Gray’s very solid defense of it.

Bottom Line

The institutions of democracy and capitalism are infinitely criticizable if one looks hard enough, but until better systems come along to take their place, they are the best we have. The same is true of the 100-point system. It is far from perfect, but it works quite well for a very large segment of the wine-drinking public. If it did not, it would not be so widely followed.

Sunday Serendipity
A New Rye That Is All Rye

Sun, 03 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Bulleit’s Frontier Whiskey has been the house Bourbon hereabouts for quite some time. It is a nicely balanced, well-defined whiskey that is at once smooth and deeply flavored. Made from a proprietary recipe said to be some 150 years old, it employs a bit more rye in its mash bill than is the norm and shows a spicier edge than a typical Kentucky Bourbon. It ranks high on our list of fine values.

Bulleit’s close-to-iconic, orange-labeled, old-fashioned flask bottle is immediately recognizable on store shelves, and more than a few of the whiskey’s fans may wonder just what is up with the brand new green-labeled version. No, Bulleit has not changed its look, the green label belongs to the distillery’s new small-batch Rye. Bulleit 95 Rye, is the latest in a series of new, high-quality Rye whiskies that are redefining an American classic.

Whereas Bourbon is distilled from a grain mash comprised at least 51% corn, American Rye whiskey by law similarly requires that it be made from at least 51% rye. Bulleit’s new version, however, checks in at a full 95% rye with a bit of malted barley (barley is important in the initial fermentation) making up the remainder of its mash bill. It is a terrific expression of just what rye tastes like, and its very deep, impressively layered, lightly nutty flavors are long on allspice, cinnamon and clove with the barest hint of brown sugar sitting off to the side. Rye was once the preferred spirit in making a the classic Manhattan cocktail, and, while Bulleit’s new offering will work splendidly as just that, it should be noted that this beautifully made whisky is so smooth and well-balanced as to be a lovely dram drunk neat.

Back at the beginning of the new year, I wrote of two top-flight Ryes whiskies, the High West Rendevous and Black Maple Hill’s 23-year-old bottling. Neither were cheap, and the pricey Black Maple Hill is one to save for the best (or worst) of times. Bulleit’s latest is not at all embarrassed when compared to either, and, like its mate orange-labeled Bourbon companion, it is nothing less than an out-and-out bargain. Depending on the market, it will be found from $20.00 to $30.00, and it is simply without peer at the price.

Friday Fishwrap
East Bay Vintners Passport Saturday

Fri, 01 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

This is no joke. I really will be out and about on Saturday tasting the wines created by the Urban wineries of the East Bay. Twenty-two of them have banded together this weekend to pour their wines in an assortment of venues in Oakland and Alameda, and they range in size and recognition from the Rosenblum Cellars to new places whose wines are new to me such as Stomping Girl Winery and Stage Left Cellars.

The twenty-two wineries will band together at six locations, some of which are already rightfully well-known like the joint location of JC Cellars and Dashe Cellars. The attractive facility will also host Aubin, Eno, Stage Left & Tayerle. And then there is Periscope Cellars showing at the home of the Linden Street Brewery, which I have not yet tried, but will have by Saturday evening.

To learn more, please check the website at: http://www.eastbayvintners.com/passport2011/

Wine and Food Wednesday
Making Food Match The Wine

Wed, 30 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

A Book Review by Stephen Eliot

It not a new book, but Lessons in Wine Service from Charlie Trotter is a book that should be better known. Written by veteran journalist Edmund O. Lawler who teaches at DePaul University, this no-nonsense little volume is a concise summary of the philosophy and practice of wine service as practiced in Mr. Trotter’s eponymously named, highly regarded restaurant in Chicago, and it came to mind this past week as I gave an impromptu presentation of the ways in which food and wine work together to a gathering of professional chef instructors. It is ostensibly written for professionals and should be required reading for anyone who works in the world of food and fine wine, but its insightful “lessons” will prove a boon to food and wine lovers of every stripe, from novices to long-time connoisseurs.

Drawn from extensive interviews with master sommeliers, chefs, restaurant staff and patrons, Lawler addresses what success means at the highest level and the kind of planning, hard work and attention to detail that are needed to achieve it. This is not a book about simple basics, and it does not offer simple answers. It not about rustic cuisine and bistro wines quaffed from carafes, but it explores those things that go into making an evening at restaurants such as Charlie Trotter’s, the French Laundy, Gary Danko, Cyrus an unforgettable experience. At the same time, however, its discussions about precise service, the ability to pay attention to the patron and pursue excellence at every level are as applicable to simple bistro dining as to the rare, high-ticket splurge.

Given that we here at CGCW are a bit oenocentric, I was particularly impressed by Trotter’s ceaseless striving to alter recipes to better align a specific dish with a particular wine. More than ready willingness to do so, Trotter and his staff seem to believe that such “tweaking” is a wholly necessary part of real excellence, as is attested by simple ideas such as “the wine is fixed, whereas the food is variable” and “that chefs need to be flexible…even the great chefs must be willing to compromise elements of their signature dishes to optimize wine pairing.” The book abounds with such useful insights.

A good many years ago, I remember winemaker Randall Graham, having just returned from Chicago, urged me in an excited, almost demanding voice that I simply must eat at Charlie Trotter’s…that the food would make me feel good. Time, as it so often does, passes quickly, and sadly I still have not heeded his plea. I have, on the other hand, been lucky enough to occasionally sit at special tables and know just what he meant. Great wine played a part in the very best of those times. Whether you are a chef or a diner, if you are one cares what those moments are made of, you will find no better explication of the topic than this significant little book.

LESSONS IN WINE SERVICE from CHARLIE TROTTER by Edmund O. Lawler
Ten Speed Press, Berkeley, California 2008. 176 pages. $24.95

ISBN-10: 1580089054
ISBN-13: 978-1580089050

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Italy Updated

Tue, 29 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Yes, it’s true. There are wines under the sun from places beyond California’s borders. One of them is Italy, the land of Piemonte and Tuscany, the Veneto and Friuli. And, when I am thinking about Italy, I drop by the blog written by Alfonso Cevola entitled “On The Wine Trail In Italy”, http://acevola.blogspot.com.

Today, I had a few minutes free after approving the Press Proof of our April issue and went over to see what Alfonso was up to now. It turns out that there are new appellations approved in Italy and Alfonso has a report on them. If you like me, drink the occasional Italian wine and have seen the number of wines from that country expand on wine lists and wondered about them, today’s blog is worth a visit. I did and found myself making notes about which of those places I have visited, from which I have tasted the wines and which ones I need to add to my own knowledge base. Today’s Best of The Blogs article resides at: http://acevola.blogspot.com/2011/03/italian-wine-docg-news-now-up-to-59.html#more

Here is a sample to wet your whistle: “There is not enough coffee or amaro to make sense of the Byzantine arrangement that the Italian government has devised to anoint the latest DOCG wines in Italy. Back rooms, mind reading, herding cats, I have tried all techniques, and I know this will be an incomplete task.”

Monday Manifestos
How To Judge A Wine By Its Label

Mon, 28 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

In recent weeks, there have been a couple of vinous dustups, mostly played out in the wine blogosphere, over statements that appear on wine labels. Needless to say, all of the participants in these debates got everything wrong, and it is time to correct the record. My primer on how to read a wine label follows.

The Winery Name: Every label has to have the name of the producer. But nothing in the laws that govern wine actually require those wines to be produced and bottled by the named entity on the label. Half of them do not exist, in point of fact. Or to be more precise, of the half that do not have a real brick and mortar premise behind the label, half of them are nothing more than paper entities that buy wine and bottle it for sale in rented facilities. And even the wineries that do exist often resort to this gambit and thus sell wine that they had virtually no contact with before it arrived in a shiny wine tanker truck. Obviously, you cannot trust a winery name to mean anything these days. My advice: choose a good wine critic, possibly Connoisseurs’ Guide, and listen to us.

The Appellation: Wines are required to be labeled with a geographic designation indicating where the grapes were sourced. That appellation can be as big geographically as “American” or as tiny as a single vineyard AVA like Cole Valley up in Mendocino. The other day, we encountered a wine label that boldly proclaimed “Estate” and then used the appellation, “California”. Andy Rooney could probably say something funny about this juxtaposition of the specific and the general. Obviously, you cannot trust an appellation to mean anything these days. My advice: choose a good wine critic, possibly Connoisseurs’ Guide, and listen to us.

Vintage Date: Now here is a label requirement that really means something—sort of. Under current rules, the date on the label means that 95% of the wine in the bottle came from the year designated. But there is a move afoot to allow a vintage date on wines containing just 85% of the wine from the year designated. If vintage dates do not mean anything, then you cannot trust them. My advice: choose a good wine critic, possibly Connoisseurs’ Guide, and listen to us.

The Percentage of Alcohol in the Wine: So much has been written about this topic recently that you know you cannot trust the alcohol level statements on wine labels. The Government allows labels to vary all over the place because the wineries say it is too hard to change labels every year, or every bottling of wines with the same label even though the wine in the bottle may be entirely different from the last batch that winery issued under the same label. My advice: choose a good wine critic, possibly Connoisseurs’ Guide, and listen to us.

Special Designations: Frankly, the world would be better place if we outlawed most of these designations like Reserve, Winemaker’s Selection, Estate, Old Vine. Established wineries do have a bit of history on their sides in this regard—except that so many of them now have Private Reserve, Reserve, Signature Series and Vineyard Designations, all of which are intended to suggest to you, the consumer, that something wonderful and out of the ordinary is contained in the bottle. None of these terms is regulated, and few of them can or ever will be defined by regulation. My advice: choose a good wine critic, possibly Connoisseurs’ Guide, and listen to us.

And All Kidding Aside: This exercise in ribaldry and cynicism does have a purpose. There are people in this world who judge wines by the label. No, not whether the family dog in on the label or whether they like the label design, although lord knows that wineries often go to great lengths to produce labels that they think have a message. No, I am talking about people who think all Russian River Valley Pinots or all Napa Valley Cabs or all Washington State Rieslings or Merlots are wonderful because so many are. And I am talking about the obverse as well: people who refuse to buy Napa Valley Cabs of any kind because some critic somewhere says they all taste like a cola drink. And, yes, I am talking about people who make buying decisions, often of expensive wines, based on the stated alcohol level on the label.

You cannot judge a book by its cover, and you cannot judge a wine by its label. It is time to stop listening to those who try to instruct us in generalities and lump the good with the bad and the bad with good. And despite the advice that some have given CGCW, even in the comments on this blog, to simply ignore the broad-brush naysayers and false prophets, we are going to continue to call them out because their bad advice and pseudo knowledge leads to bad decisions.

Here is how to read a label. Don’t. Taste the wine instead. Trust your own palate. And yes, listen to us.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Grading The Players In The Pinot Noir Kerfluffle

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I would have thought that this tempest in a teapot would have gone away by now, but apparently it has longer legs than most of the participants would have wanted. And rather than let it go away so that the world could move on to the next vinous brouhaha, the whole thing is being kept alive by various writers and observers, some of whom were actually there and are either still writing articles about the event or are commenting on blogs where the issue seems to keep popping up. This essay will not end the debate, but it will make perfectly clear where CGCW stands on the issue.

Here are the facts as I know them in a nutshell. Two weeks ago at a seminar, a panel was assembled at the World of Pinot Noir event to discuss alcohol levels and Pinot Noir. Eric Asimov, the lead New York Times winewriter, moderated a panel of several noteworthy and knowledgeable persons. Somewhere towards the end of the discussion, Rajat Parr, one of America’s leading sommeliers and a proponent in general of moderated alcohol wines, commented privately on two wines from Siduri to Adam Lee, owner/winemaker for that brand. He said he particularly liked a wine that carried a label claiming 13.6% alcohol and suggested that he would like to buy some for a wine list at one of the 18 restaurants for which he buys wine. Mr. Lee then fessed up that he had switched the labels and that the wine Parr intended to buy was the one with 15.2% alcohol. Mr. Parr admitted that he was surprised by the wine and that Mr. Lee could, if he wanted, tell the seminar of that he, Parr, had chosen the higher alcohol wine. Mr. Lee then did exactly that.

Now, all of this would have amounted to next to nothing because winetasting is an inexact art to begin with and we all know it. Moreover, Mr. Parr made no pronouncement about alcohol levels. He simply chose to buy the higher alcohol wine and did not find it hot or out of balance or anything else that the bashers ascribe to such wines. It was not Mr. Parr’s choice that ultimately became the cause celebre here. It was the switching of the labels, and the notion in some quarters that Mr. Lee had played a dirty trick on Mr. Parr.

With that as a too-long introduction, here is my take on the key players in this inside baseball drama and what it all means.

Eric Asimov, Moderator: Mr. Asimov thought he was in charge of the discussion until Mr. Lee interrupted with his announcement of the Parr admission. This seems to have upset Mr. Asimov who feels like Mr. Lee was out of order. There are those who think Mr. Asimov has an oar in this debate on the side of lower alcohol wines, and maybe he does, but he has also chosen wines to recommend, including a Siduri wine, that were well over 14%. He is not an ideologue in that regard. He may have a preference for one style over another but he judges wines, not labels. If he stands guilty of anything, it is that he protests too much. Let Parr and Lee duke it out. But this is small potatoes and hopefully, now that he has had his say through his blog entry of yesterday, he will move on.

Rajat Parr, Sommelier and Wine Buyer for the Michael Mina restaurants, and partner in RN 74 at which he chooses to buy only California Pinot Noir and Chardonnay under 14% alcohol: Mr. Parr was somewhat blindsided by the switched labels, but he is a professional. Indeed, he is a professional’s professional, and since he was not trying to choose a wine based on alcohol content in the first place, he simply chose the Siduri wine that he preferred. That he preferred the 15.2% wine is not an indictment. It is a simple statement of preference in this case. He may generally prefer wines of a certain style, but he proved that he chooses wines by taste, not by label. And when he was apprised of the actuality of his choice, he invited Mr. Lee to make the choice public. I personally think his stand on alcohol is somewhat doctrinaire, but we all have preferences at some point, and he is as entitled to his as I am to mine as each of us to our wine. And full props to Mr. Parr for not running away from his choice at that point.

Mr. Lee, owner/winemaker and professor of the “balance is king” school: There are folks who are describing what he did as the “old switcheroo” and see it as some kind of dirty trick. And, yes, at some level, it is. But, Mr. Lee has a point to prove, and he is adamant, as are we at Connoisseurs’ Guide, that using label statements as some kind of pass/fail measure is a fool’s errand. One chooses wines by taste, not by label. One can prefer, in general, wines of a certain kind, but every time a wine professional tells us that he knows the answer, he gets proven wrong by the wines. Not always, maybe not even often, but we would all do well to remember the story most often attributed to Harry Waugh, the late and legendary English wine writer, “When was the last time you confused Burgundy with Bordeaux”, he was asked. “Not since lunch”, came the reply. Mr.Lee is on a mission to prove that assertions about alcohol levels over 14% having, a priori, deleterious effects on wine quality are a bunch of hooey. He has exposed his wines to this test before and every time he does it, the wine wins, not the label. Maybe what he did was not fully kosher, but, then, denigrating wine by label statement is a lot worse.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Syrah To The Rescue

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I do not particularly trust Spring, never have. It is fickle, it is hesitant and it is always late. The calendar on my desk says that it arrived today, but the chill-wind-driven dark clouds outside my window and the ice that I scraped from my windshield this morning are irrevocable proof that I have been lied to again. What is worse is that the popular press seems an accomplice in the hoax and is already making the turn to wines for warm-weather drinking and dining. I am sitting here freezing.

Nope, I am not ready to give up the heady and warming wines that seem so well suited to winter. Keep your Timorassos and Txakolis. Do not bother me just yet with your Grecos, Grillos, Grechettos and Gruner Veltliners. Refreshment is not what I am looking for just yet. When I see the sun for three days in a row, I will think about Rosé, Pinot Gris and Sauvignon Blanc, but not before. I still want something that will warm from within; something that will find fair alliance with the barely bubbling pot of garlicky lamb shanks that waits for dinner. I want something red, and I want something rich.

Now, it is far from fashionable or oeno-politically correct to say a kind word in the defense of Syrah these days, but I think that is just what is called for this evening. Syrah has become an easy target; the red counterpart of Chardonnay whose damning proves one to be genuinely savvy and vinously hip. It seems the new recipient of “anything but” status. I will concede there are more than a few utterly uninteresting and downright boring bottlings to be had, and a good many recommended food-and-Syrah combinations leave me mystified and sometimes alarmed. Nevertheless, well-made Syrah, and there are many, is wine with much to offer. The best provide unmatched satisfaction with the kinds of hearty fare that I crave in these last dreary weeks of winter.

I have always thought that a classic, garlic-larded leg of lamb, braised short ribs and highly seasoned roasts on the bone sometimes overmatch the Cabernet crowd, and a savory Syrah’s extra sense of muscle and mass is often the prescription for real success. Mind you, I am not talking about throat-burning, over-the-top monsters that speak more to chocolate than fruit, but ripeness in itself is no vice. There are accomplished Syrah producers like JC Cellars, Darioush, DuMol, Shafer and Ramey that push the limits with regard to ripeness and sheer size and still offer up wines of extraordinary interest and depth. Others such as Dutton Goldfield, Ojai Vineyard, Breggo, Qupé and Novy pull back a bit from the brink and similarly show just how complex and involving good Syrah can be. It turns out that the list of worthies, both big and bigger, is actually quite a long one, and I feel a little less “unschooled” as I head to the cellar to pick tonight’s bottle. For this evening and this meal, Syrah is a “nothing but” choice.

Here are a few recent Connoisseurs’ Guide favorites...

92 BREGGO Alder Springs Vineyard Syrah Mendocino County 2007 $55.00
There is a real sense of polish about this bottling that sets it apart from the brawnier crowd, yet, even if very well-balanced and slightly supple in feel, it still musters lots of very solid Syrah fruit with abundant sweet oak enriching the mix. In some ways recalling Merlot or even a good Pinot insofar as its close-to-velvety feel goes, it invites drinking now but has a good deal in reserve and will unfold and become more involving in four or five years.
Reviewed: November 2010

91 JC CELLARS Fess Parker's Vineyard Syrah Santa Barbara County 2008 $30.00
Spot-on varietal spice and pepper get full play in this very expressive Syrah, and an extra bit of roasted meat gaminess is layered atop its very generous blackberry fruit. If ripe and mouthfilling, the wine is ever so slightly less so than most of its cellarmates, and its rich, nicely balanced, very long-lasting finish shows nary a hint of last-minute heat. It too has a long life before it, but it is so structured as to also be useful now as a foil to a juicy, garlic-larded leg of lamb.
Reviewed: March 2011

92 MacROSTIE Wildcat Mountain Syrah Sonoma Coast 2006 $34.00
Nicely ripened blackberry scents with spicy, nutmeg and cocoa-like accents are followed on the palate by a supple entry and then by firming acidity. A bit of early flesh helps open up the wine a bit, and its solid, deep and balanced flavors hold well into the its long, somewhat zesty finish. Not a massive wine, it nonetheless will reward a few years of cellaring, and its best uses with food are likely to be a bit more refined than the more beamy, bold Syrahs seem to demand.
Reviewed: November 2010

91 NOVY Christensen Family Vineyard Syrah Russian River Valley 2008 $27.00
Rather more modest than its mates as far as its expression of full-throttle varietal spice goes, this very deep, optimally ripened look at Syrah is directed almost entirely by abundant fruit and its peppery accents are just that. It is full and slightly viscous to start but quickly firms and sheds its baby fat as it takes a more structured stance. There is plenty of room for improvement and growth here, and, if three or four years are the minimal waiting period, it boasts the look of wine that will evolve for many years.
Reviewed: March 2011

91 ZACA MESA Syrah Santa Ynez Valley 2006 $23.00
Fans of expressively gamy Syrah should find a good deal to like here, but so too will those who like their Syrahs on the rich and well-ripened side. The wine is a big one, yet it is nicely balanced, and it does a fine job of hiding its heat. Neither its acidity nor its ample tannins are excessive, and the two are seamlessly fit. It is sufficiently fruity to enjoy early on but has the extract and depth to improve for a few years. Zaca Mesa seems to get it right with Syrah year in and year out. Well done.
Reviewed: November 2010

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
The Next Big Thing—Pick Your Poison

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The wine world loves new things. When we find a new toy, we run with it until we break it, and then we move on. Some of those new toys turn out to last a lifetime. Others go the way of the hula hoop.

California Chardonnay is one that came on late, just kept getting better and better, and even now, fifty years after it finally became a new toy, then a special, shiny new toy and then the new toy that drove out so many other toys like Sylvaner, Grey Riesling, Green Hungarian, Chenin Blanc, Gewürztraminer, Chardonnay is turning another corner and becoming even more special.

But, just as the boxing world is always looking for a new champ, so too does the wine world keep looking. Look at the contenders that have come and gone just in the last few decades—Sangiovese, Gruner Veltliner and Aussie Shiraz. Which one of the current breed of market favorites is going to get the chop next. Syrah, Zinfandel, Merlot among reds? Italian Pinot Grigios and White Zinfandel among “white” wines.

That topic is addressed brilliantly in one of my bits of required reading. The blog called The Wine Economist somehow manages to keep me on my toes trying to keep up with Professor Mike Veseth’s various themes and thoughts. Always challenging, often revealing new truth, The Wine Economist is one of those smart blogs. Most blogs, no matter how good they are, are rarely smart. It is the unusual piece of winewriting that cause its readers to take a step back and think about the world we live in.

This week’s Best of Blogs does just that through the good professor’s essay entitled “The Next Big Thing In Wine”. It appears at the following link and is worth a read: http://wineeconomist.com/2011/03/21/whats-the-next-big-thing-in-wine/

Here is the line that got me hooked. To be sure, there is a bit of misdirection at the front of the essay, but one Professor Veseth wrote the following, I went all in because he was making me think. Read on and you may also get hooked.

“Many of the winemakers and winery executives I talk with around the world display an understandable fascination with THE NEXT BIG THING. White Zin, which once defined TNBT here in the United States, shows that fads and trends can at least sometimes develop staying power, as the huge sales figures make clear. But TNBT of today cannot afford to get too comfortable — there’s always another NBT on the horizon”

Monday Manifestos
The Greening of Chardonnay

Mon, 21 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Chardonnay is a tricky little devil. On one hand, it is often said by winemakers that it ferments like a red wine. On a second hand, some will tell you that the grape has a very plain personality on its own and needs extra attention in winemaking to become special. If you had a third hand, you would hold high-ripeness Chardonnay in it and taste a lot of glycerin and ripe apples, and in your fourth hand, you would hold low-ripeness Chardonnay that tastes of green pineapples and bristling acidity.

It is not that making Chardonnay is all that complicated. It is not nearly as finicky as Pinot Noir, for instance, but it does present the winemaker with challenges because it is like a clean palette waiting for the artist to choose the colors and then to apply them. How much apple? How much fresh fruit? How much roasted grains from lees-aging? How much oak? How much acidity? Do I push my Chardonnay through malo-lactic fermentation and get a smoother, softer feel on the palate or do I retain the malic acid and hold onto a brighter sensation?

And these decisions, and others, are not all made in the winery once the grapes have arrived. Critical decisions need to be made in the vineyard—decisions in which the winemakers are involved, like crop load and picking parameters (how ripe, how much natural acidity), also impact how the final product will taste.

And it is not like California winemakers have had a century and more to learn how to make these decisions. Just fifty years ago, there was so little Chardonnay here that its acreage was not measured separately, and the grape was lumped into the category of “other red varieties”.

When Chardonnay began to come onto the scene in the 1960s, there were two emerging styles. The first was a simple, wood tank aged, near generic tasting wine whose major virtue was that it was dry and somewhat rich. California really did not have white wines like that; most whites of the day came to market with noticeable sweetness. The second Chardonnay direction was what could be called “Burgundy Light”. It involved the use of oak-barrels from France for aging the wine and brought Chardonnay into the modern era. It was this style, still somewhat undeveloped but successful nonetheless, that propelled Chardonnay into the most important white grape we grow here in California.

Over the next several decades, producers improved the “recipe” with barrel fermentations, lees aging and stirring, increased ripeness and richness (often from vineyard decisions), and while there have always been variations on the theme, Chardonnay raced to the top of the heap based on a style that was no longer “Burgundy Light” but “Burgundy Heavy” or even “Burgundy Over The Top” in many instances. The same direction was taken by many Australian winemakers, and, we learned a separate identifier meant to eliminate references to France. Our wines became “New World” as if they no longer had any connection to France. Regardless of how true or not that proposition, might have been, it became de rigueur in some circles, to treat “New World” Chardonnay like some kind of bastard child, a “black sheep” of sorts not to be respected or enjoyed on its own but to be denigrated because it was no longer “Burgundian”. Never mind that people loved the new Chardonnay, many folks, especially those who think the French style is the style for them, often because that is what their wine teeth were weaned on, were put off by the new richness and fullness of the New World products.

As that movement, and the voices that propelled it, got bigger, louder, more noticeable, Chardonnay began to change again—for better and for worse. And it must be acknowledged that many producers here remained closer to the French model than they are being given credit for. But, it was the core of the Chardonnay producers who began to recognize that a little less ripeness and a little more acidity gave their wines more brightness, more liveliness and actually handled all that California richness quite well. We celebrate wines like Ramey, Freestone, Dutton Goldfield, MacRostie and dozens more whose approaches combine richness and inner energy.

It is not their efforts that concern me and bring me to the nub of this story. The title of this essay is “The Greening of Chardonnay”. It is an intentional play on words. On the one hand, it refers to the continuing success that Chardonnay enjoys in the marketplace. Despite a movement that refers to itself as ABC (Anything But Chardonnay), there is plenty of Chardonnay and people continue to love it even as its styles have evolved over the last four decades.

But, it is the other mean of “Greening” that can no longer be ignored and which threatens to bring Chardonnay down if it goes too far and we stop listening to the grapes. When winemakers ignore the fact that they are growing grapes and making wine in California, not Chablis, and try to tame the grape into something that resembles a style from somewhere else, they run into trouble. We saw the so-called “Food Wine” revolution of the mid-80s turn too many Chardonnays into thin, acidic, underripe potions whose attempts to taste more European simply made them into tasteless, “green” messes. Today, the “greening” of Chardonnay has the potential to take us there again. It is this threat to our most popular white wine which concerns me. Underripe is no more pleasant to taste than overripe. Poorly made wines with no oak are no interesting than poorly made wines with too much oak.

If we here in California want Chardonnay to remain “green” in the positive sense of the word, we cannot let it become “green” in the negative sense lest it once again repeat the mistakes of the 1980s and turn into a wine that people do not like. We have a good thing going on here in California with our Chardonnay. In trying to make it even better, we do not need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The baby is just fine. All we need to do is to adjust the temperature a little.

Friday Fishwrap
Say A Kind Word For Merlot

Fri, 18 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Merlot has come in for a bit of a drubbing this week. Our blog entry earlier this week questioned whether Merlot had ever done nearly as much for Cabernet Sauvignon as it was supposed to do when it was introduced here some four decades ago. My buddy Steve Heimoff’s eponymously named blog took a somewhat different swipe at the grape in an article entitled, “I Did Not Get The Merlot Memo”.

In a move that could only be described as “piling on”, I aided and abetted the Heimoff thesis with the following comment, “we have lost the lush, fruity Merlot that made the grape popular in the first place because of two things, in my opinion, of course. The first is that we do not have Merlot planted in the right places, thus there is not enough very good Merlot no matter how much of it is selling at low prices, and secondly, Merlot makers, in their attempts to get Cab-like prices for Merlot are making the wine more and more like Cabernet Sauvignon. There are plenty of good ersatz Cabs among Merlots, but not enough Merlot-like Merlots.”

About this point, you are probably wondering where the “kind word” for Merlot will come in, and I will confess that I am having some difficulty coming up with a long and cogent article for the continuance of Merlot in the status of noble variety.

Merlot is not, by itself, a noble variety in terms of its best foot forward all by itself. In Bordeaux, it is blended with Cabernet Franc on the Right Bank of the river, and it is blended with Cabernet Sauvignon on the Left Bank. When one goes looking for great Merlots, wines whose very essence is defined by Merlot, they are few and far between. Here in California, with our rules that encourage wines bottled under varietal names, it is Merlot’s fate to struggle.

To be sure, there are several good ones, and you need look no further than Duckhorn for proof. There are a host of others, of course, but this host is often helped along by Cabernet Sauvignon and other Bordelais varieties, and it is simply the rare Merlot that achieves high commendation based on the pure fruit and supple and succulent posture that made Merlot popular when it first started appearing in California vineyards.

Maybe it was unkind to describe the majority of highly rated Merlot as ersatz Cabernet Sauvignon. After all, Merlot does make up the biggest percentage of the wine in the bottle. So, there is that to be said in Merlot’s behalf. But there is one more thing, perhaps to be said quietly at this point, but that must be said. Many Merlots from the Columbia Valley up Washington State way do a fine job of capturing the open, inviting side of the grape while still providing those wines with sufficient backbone. And when one tastes some of the inexpensive Merlots from the Columbia Valley, it is clear that Merlot can be made in the manner at all price levels.

Perhaps, after all, there is something kind to be said for Merlot. It need not be shunned or shunted to the corner or be treated as a cheap country cousin. Perhaps all it needs is to be allowed to come home.

Wine and Food Wednesday
The Right Red Wine With Fish and Chocolate Cake

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I can hear it now, the same old refrain; “drink what you like with what you like.” Perfectly good advice, I agree, but advice that proceeds from the simple premise that you, in fact, know what you like. Knowing what you like presumes that you have tried a good many wines and, with them, a good many food and wine combinations. I suppose I cannot argue with someone who has tried three or four wines and has summarily decided that Pinot Grigio is the answer, and that it is the ideal companion to barbecued ribs, carnitas burritos and chocolate doughnuts. If washing down grilled swordfish with a bottle of port is your thing, well, who am I to say that you are wrong. Then again, there are those who believe that prints of dogs playing poker and black-velvet paintings of Elvis are true works of art. You see the point.

The truth of the matter is that wine and its ability to work its own unique magic at the table is a life-long journey of discovery that, with experience and the increased knowledge that experience brings, inevitably leads to greater dining and drinking pleasure. Those of us who pursue pleasure in the world of wine and food have all had a revelatory moment or two of almost transcendent discovery and were astonished at just how good a wine and its union with food could really be. It is as if we suddenly saw color in a world that heretofore had been defined in black and white, and it made us wonder at just what else we might have been missing. I expect that most passions begin something like this. One discovery leads to another, and we find our own truths.

So, what of those who are just starting out, who have reached the point that they want to know more and understand that there are, in fact, things to know. Those who champion experiment without boundary or direction, of throwing all rules out the window rarely acknowledge that such a course necessarily comes with a need for fairly deep pockets in randomly trying this and that wine with whatever dish. I have heard it said that the millennial “click and go” generation is of just such a mindset, but as the parent of a card-carrying millennial, I would beg to differ. My very smart, very well-educated daughter has begun to ask the question upon being struck by the sheer deliciousness of a particular wine and food match, “how do you know?” It is also a question that I hear every day from my students at the California Culinary Academy, and a quick answer that you spend money, buy wines, pull corks and see what you think would not be well received. My response, instead, is that you taste, you ask questions and you read. And you read.

There are more than a few books on the topic, some good and some easily overlooked, but there are a handful that I recommend without qualification. Red Wine with Fish by David Rosengarten and Joshua Wesson was one of the first to rethink convention and look at recurring ways that food and wine did or did not succeed together. Even though twenty-years old and now out of print, it remains an exciting and useful volume for those wanting to learn. Look for it in used book stores. One of the best, The Wine Lover’s Cookbook by our old friend, the late and sorely missed Sid Goldstein remains on the short list of must-read offerings for its wonderfully sensible insights on varietal character and what makes a great food-and-wine match. Tom Maresca’s lengthy and very intelligent The Right Wine is a thorough and thoughtful discussion of basic paring principles, and, while sometimes criticized as being a bit euro-centric, Wine With Food by Joanna Simon is a solid foundation for those with a serious eye to learning. Rounding out my list of five favorites, Evan Goldstein’s Perfect Pairings: A Master Sommelier’s Practical Advice for Pairing Wine and Food delivers just what it promises from one of the wine world’s more experienced voices, and its inclusion of some fifty recipes from chef/mom, the accomplished Joyce Goldstein, comes as a noteworthy bonus.

Books, of course, are only one resource in the building of real knowledge, and none of the works cited professes to be the door to truth. Their authors are all quick to point out that there are no absolutes, no immutable “Tao” of food and wine pairing, but each book very capably drives home the point that there are people who know what they are doing, and that what they have to say is worth listening to. If you want to learn more, if you believe in education and that perfection comes of practice, they are a great place to start.

Monday Manifestos
What If Harry Never Met Sally

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Harry and Sally. Anthony and Cleopatra. Tristan and Isolde. Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. The history of the world is replete with partners who could not get along without each other. Back about four decades ago, when California wine was emerging as a hot commodity, the first Merlots began to be planted here—ostensibly to make Cabernet Sauvignon more complete. Never mind that we also did not have Cabernet Franc, Malbec or Petit Verdot. We discovered tannin, French oak and Merlot, and the die was cast that soon made California Cabernet into a world-recognized item.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the Forum, and we are not talking about Mark Anthony, Brutus or Caesar here. It turned out that Merlot not only was plenty good on its own, something the Bordelais on the Right Bank thought might be true and which now even some Left Bank Bordelaise are thinking about, but California-grown Cabernet Sauvignon, especially in certain Rutherford Bench and Stags Leap District locations, could be vinified to suppleness and graciousness on it own.

There are, of course, plenty of blends made in California, and some like Phelps Insignia are absolutely brilliant wines. But even that wine over the years has been heavily weighted to Cabernet Sauvignon, and the influence of Merlot and the other Bordelaise varieties has been restrained. It all makes you wonder what would have happened if our Cabernet Sauvignon had never met Merlot.

The problem here is that I have been writing Cabernet Sauvignon tasting notes all day, and despite the fact that about one-quarter of the one hundred-plus to be reviewed in our April Issue contain some portion of Merlot, I don’t see evidence that Merlot is doing much to soften or fill out or otherwise enhance Cabernet Sauvignon’s personality.

Indeed, if anything, it is the other way around. With the Merlots that are also being reviewed in that Issue, it is Cabernet Sauvignon that is giving both structure and complexity and which shows up far more often in Merlot than Merlot shows up in Cabernet. And, not to put too fine a point on it, in part because a solid conclusion will require more observation and many more data points and comparative tastings, but it seems to me that an interesting argument could be made that Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot do more to expand Cabernet Sauvignon than does Merlot.

California will probably never stop learning from the French or the Italians or the Spanish when it comes to grapes and blends, but it does make one wonder what would have happened if the makers of Cabernet Sauvignon had never heard of Bordeaux.

Friday Fishwrap
A Correction of Sorts

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 19:30:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

In the blog entry directly below, I have attributed to Eric Asimov a set of Pinot Noir recommendations. My bad. Those recommendations appear under the byline of Howard Goldberg, another New York Times writer about things vinous.

I have reached out to Mr. Asimov to ask him to give us his views on the subject of choosing wines by stated alcohol versus by taste. He has so far declined. But, in fairness to him, he has written the following about a tasting of Santa Barbara County Pinot Noirs (New York Times, May 2007):

“We did find wines that struck us as over the top, soft and sweet, with flavors that would overpower food. But we were also pleasantly surprised by how many wines seemed balanced and somewhat restrained.”

His panel’s top wine was Siduri’s Clos Pepe 2004 about which he commented in full: “Earthy and bright with floral and cherry aromas; well balanced and structured”. This wine is 14.3% alcohol, and while that is not 16%, it is higher than many people believe is appropriate as a guiding principle. His panel’s second place wine runs 14.7%; it is described as “Cherry, cola and violet aromas and flavors balanced by vibrant acidity; bright but not overbearing.”

I could be wrong again, but it seems to me that Mr. Asimov’s own choices and words put him squarely on the same side of the issue, in concept at least, with Siduri’s Adam Lee, with Raj Parr and with Connoisseurs’ Guide. We may or may not agree about individual wines, but it is not too much to suggest that Mr. Asimov judges wine by what is in the glass, not by what is on the label. That concept lies at the heart of the “Big Kerfluffle”. It is what Adam Lee was trying to prove. It is what Connoisseurs’ Guide proves over and over again. It is what Mr. Asimov’s own reviews prove.

Let the wines speak, not the labels.

Friday Fishwrap
The Great Pinot Noir Kerfluffle-—Let The Wines Speak

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Perhaps you’ve heard this story already. World-famous sommelier refuses to put California Chards and Pinot Noirs over 14% alcohol on his wine list, then, when presented with two wines, one under 14% and one over 15% with the labels switched, chooses the one with the higher alcohol. Well, there is more to this story than the simple switching of labels.

The sommelier is Raj Parr, head of wine for the Michael Mina chain of 18 upscale restaurants, and, in truth, Parr only follows that policy at his personal location, RN 74 in San Francisco. But regardless of the openness of his other lists, there is an underlying suggestion in some of his comments that California Chards and Pinots over 14% have a cooked character while wines under 14% have a fresh character. He has denied that he means that in any doctrinaire fashion.

Here is the quote in which he explains that he uses Burgundy as a model, “I know what I like -- freshness and vibrancy. I look for fruit components -- I like more of the cool fruit, not cooked fruit”. Some would conflate that comment with his preference for lower alcohol wines and find something sinister in it. More on this later together with what I take to be agreement of sorts among all parties.

This incident and the seminar at which it occurred has been widely reported. Today the moderator of the seminar has now commented to noted English writer Jancis Robinson. Ms. Robinson picked up the story based on the very complete reporting of the seminar by blogger Alder Yarrow, over on Vinography. Apparently, Mr. Yarrow can type almost as fast as people talk because he often brings us nearly complete transcripts of occasions like this.

Here is the added comment on Ms. Robinson’s blog. “Moderator Eric Asimov has contacted me to point out that in fact no-one in the gathering was asked to identify which of Adam Lee's (Siduri) wines was which, so that no definitive conclusions should be drawn about what (happened) “.

So, where are we? I have spoken with Adam Lee, who told me that no one who has reported on the event, aside from those who were there, had bothered to talk to him. I have had exchanges of emails with Alder Yarrow, whose reporting, I will repeat, is amazing in itself. And I have exchanged emails with the New York Times’ Eric Asimov. And, now I have tracked down the famous Mr. Raj Parr, and, frankly this is a bit of a tempest in a teapot.

There appears to be agreement that the event happened. There is less agreement about what it means. To Adam Lee, who has been arguing that alcohol is not the culprit by itself and has engaged other wine writers in proofs of his theory, the choice of the higher alcohol wine was another data point, another anecdote that adds to the body of evidence that supports his theory. Clearly, neither Mr. Asimov nor Mr. Parr agree with that interpretation. Parr explains it as “I never intended the wine for RN 74. It was always going to go to another restaurant in the chain”.

Messrs. Parr and Asimov agree that it was all very casual, and that even with the choice of the higher alcohol wine, there was no orchestrated study of the wines nor any attempt to discern where the higher alcohol lay. That is the basis for the Asimov suggestion that no definitive conclusions should be reached based on the event, and Mr. Parr concurs in that.

Mr. Parr, in conversation just a bit ago, also made clear that the RN 74 policy applies only to Burgundian varieties and not to other varieties and types at RN 74, and he also made clear that no such policy or selection criterion exists at the other seventeen Michael Mina restaurants. And when pressed, he absolutely concurred that the best method for choosing wines in by tasting them, not by reading the labels.

Adam Lee will still insist that Parr chose the higher alcohol wine and that this is proof that balanced wines can exist at 15.2 alcohol. Connoisseurs’ Guide agrees with that argument. So does Raj Parr, in fact, even if wines with higher alcohols are typically not classically Burgundian. He is, after all, the wine man behind a chain of fancy West Coast restaurants. And, while I hope I am not putting words in his mouth, I am guessing that Eric Asimov agrees as well. In his Pinot Noir article published yesterday, he lists Marcassin, Williams Selyem, Rochioli, Merry Edwards and Kistler among his California favorites and Ken Wright, up in Oregon, as among the tops there. These are not producers of low alcohol Pinot Noirs, and some would argue that a few of those producers offer over the top styles.

Adam Lee will feel somewhat vindicated by what happened, and the rest of us have had a lesson in taste reiterated for us. Alcohol above 14% is not the culprit in this drama. Unbalanced, heavy wines are. There is no longer any deep controversy here, unless you feel that Mr. Lee pulled a fast one. The bottom line is that the incident stands as one more proof of something that has been the watchword for Connoisseurs’ Guide from the day that Earl Singer and I first conceived of it early in 1974. “Let the wines speak”.

Wine and Food Wednesday
He Was Alice Waters Before There Was An Alice Waters

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

He fought along side Hemingway in Spain. He served his country in the Pacific campaign for four years. He was a Berkeley pacifist. He was a public health advocate turned restaurateur. His innovative Berkeley establishment, founded in 1960 made him Alice Waters before there was an Alice Waters. He was the wine editor for the San Francisco Chronicle for fifteen years. He was Jon Bonne before there was a Jon Bonne. He was the wine and spirits editor of Bon Appetit Magazine back in the day when one-third of that magazine’s content was devoted to consumable potions. He was Marvin Shanken before there was a Marvin Shanken. And he lived to the ripe old age of ninety-four before passing away quietly in his sleep last week.

And he was my mentor in wine and the person who first introduced me to the notion that wine better than Hearty Burgundy existed. A decade later, when I started Connoisseurs’ Guide, he became a member of our tasting panel. His name: Henry Rubin, known to his friends as Hank. He was a giant in the wine and food business back in the days when giants were few and far between.

In 1963, when I moved to the Bay Area to attend graduate school at a place south of San Francisco, one of my college roommates moved to Berkeley to study Nuclear Physics. In college days back east, our small group had become winedrinkers, leaving the world of strong drink behind in a move toward sophistication that was at least as much directed to impressing the women we were dating as to serving our palates. I got a call not long after arriving out west inviting me to come up to Berkeley and to join my friend at a wine tasting at a Berkeley restaurant. He seemed to think that there was magic in the Monday night events at the Potluck Restaurant, and I soon discovered that he was right. I did not get to as many of those events as I would have wished, graduate students do not have a lot of free time, but things changed when I graduated and moved into the City.

The Potluck was still going strong, fueled in part by a brilliant young chef named Narsai David who would go on to become famous in his own right In those days, Narsai was simply Hank’s newest protégé. The Potluck became my restaurant of choice, and when Hank finally closed it down and moved full-time into winewriting, Narsai’s new eponymously named restaurant continued the wine and food tradition that was so instrumental in my wine education.

For the next two decades, Hank was a fixture on the winetasting circuit, and he always seemed to be surrounded by a group of younger writers eager to lap up the wisdom that he shared so effortlessly. In the last decade of his life, he slowed down a bit, but still had time to author the highly useful The Kitchen Answer Book.

And now that he has freed the bounds of this earth, I find myself thinking that I have always wanted to follow in his footsteps—and if I can keep writing for another decade or two, I just might. Please stop a minute and join me in being thankful that this world had such a man as Hank Rubin.

Ten Rules For California Winemakers

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Government is always making rules for wineries, and most of them are not helpful. And even the ones that are helpful are not always enforced. I have been hanging around the Internet most of this past weekend, and I have discovered that winewriters also have rules for winemakers—and they aren’t enforced either. But, sometimes the wineries think they have to live by them. It is time to sort out the confusion, and I am the guy to make fun of our own rules.

Rule: Don’t bother telling us that your alcohol statements on wine labels are accurate.

We all know that you the Gov’t lets you exaggerate, and now it turns out that the Gov’t is not enforcing the very rules it promulgates. If you want us to believe that alcohol labeling means something, it is time for you to tell the Gov’t that its rules are far too lax.

Rule: Stop putting Syrah into your Pinot Noir.

We all know that Pinot has no color when left to its own devices so we winewriters do not have to smell the wine to know there is Syrah in the cepage. If your Pinot has color, it has Syrah.

Rule: Why are you bothering to talk about terroir?

We all know that there is no such thing as terroir in California. Only Europe has terroir. They invented it, and they aren’t sharing. Never mind telling us that anyone with half a nose can smell the difference between Pinot Noir from Westside Road from Pinot Noir from Freestone regardless of the fact that they are both labeled with a Russian River Valley appellation.

Rule: If you tell us that you got your 2010 late-ripening reds in before the rains, you have to go directly to jail. Do not pass Go.

Fess up, boys. Aside from the early-arriving varieties, and especially in the North Coast, it was simply not your best vintage. Oh sure, some of you will succeed. You had little umbrellas over your grapes or you simply got lucky, but every time we winewriters hear that 2010 was not as bad as advertised, we wonder if your nose is growing.

Rule: Robert Parker is dead. Well, not dead, exactly, but he’s gone, folks. You can now go back to making wine to satisfy wine drinkers instead of the beast of the east.

Besides, there are always folks like Jim Laube, Steve Heimoff, Steve Tanzer, Jon Bonne, Lettie Teague, yours truly, a thousand bloggers and the collective voices of Snooth and Cellar Tracker to help you find right from wrong, fruit and desiccated grapes, oak from oak chips.

Rule: Wines with residual sugar are not dry.

It is not our place to tell you not to make your Chardonnay with a teaspoon of sugar. It helped Mary Poppins so why not you. But, please, not only do some of us come equipped with reasonably trained palates but we know how to use Dextrocheck—and it is good enough to tell dry from not dry. Oh, and Riesling makers, the term Medium Dry is an oxymoron. Those wines are not dry, they are slightly and noticeably sweet.

Rule: Lose the critters from your labels—all of them.

Just because the Aussies thought they could sell wine with Kangaroos does not mean that you should put pictures of the family dog on the label or name your vineyards after them. Not every label with a canine prominently displayed has character that is about as unpleasant as a barking canine, but when yours does, don’t blame us for the bad jokes that ensue. The target is just too easy.

Rule: Try to remember that your wines do not go with everything.

Cracked crab, pizza and chocolate cake as wine recommendations might be fine, but not on the same label.

Rule: Twitter is not your friend.

I know that several hundred of you have signed on to follow me on Twitter. And believe me, I do make an effort to read everyone of your Tweets. But, folks, I have to tell you that none of us—not you, not me, not Robin Williams—can be interesting in 140 characters or less on a regular basis.

Rule: Don’t stop loving the blogosphere even though almost everyone who posts there is in the wine biz.

Yes, winemakers, those new entrants to winewriting have plenty of interesting things to say. And yes, a few of them actually do get readers who are not in the biz. But not all that many. Go look at the comments here or, better yet, over on a really popular blog like Steve Heimoff. I saw a comment there yesterday that I swore was from an amateur—a real wine drinker and not an industry person looking for a moment of glory. But I was wrong. He was just a new blogger whose head is not yet swollen into believing his own word. Oh, well. He will.

Sunday Serendipity
Rum: More than Mai Tais and Daiquiris.

Sun, 06 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Remember when Tequila was solely about Sunrises and Margaritas, and when you would hard-pressed to find more than a half-dozen brands? Things have most assuredly changed over the last decade, and dozens and dozens of “luxury” offerings, as the trade terms them, now compete for attention on retailers’ shelves and in up-scale watering holes. Single Malt Scotches, regarded as fairly esoteric stuff a generation back are now mainstream tipples among discerning spirit drinkers, and American Bourbon has taken on new respectability as impeccably crafted, barrel-aged bottling have made their ways to the market. Now, it just may be fine Rum’s turn to grab a spot in the connoisseurs’ spotlight.

Back in 2009, we spent a long evening tasting and talking about a wide range of remarkable rums with their producers and representative at the San Francisco Ministry of Rum Festival, and there were more than a few eye-opening efforts that ranked with the more complex and satisfying spirits to be had. I am not talking about the bright and aromatic sugar-cane distillates that serve as the base for a host of refreshing Caribbean cocktails, for these were very old, cask-aged creations that were clearly meant for drinking neat and savored after a meal much in the manner of fine Cognac and the like.

Among my favorites of a good many outstanding Rums of the evening were the El Dorado bottlings produced by Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL) of Guyana. Among the first distillers to market premium aged rums, DDL introduced the 15 year-old Special Reserve Eldorado in 1992, and the brand remains at the forefront of truly remarkable spirits that deserve to be much better known. It now has a permanent place on the spirits cabinet at Chez Eliot

I recently capped off a first-rate meal at San Francisco’s new and noteworthy Comstock Saloon with a small snifter of the heretofore untasted El Dorado 21 year-old version. It was the star of the evening and in turn the inspiration for this Sunday’s posting. It strikes me that the issue here is not so much that fine, well-aged Rums are underappreciated as much as they are simply not near well enough known. There is nothing about the best rums, be they from El Dorado or Barbancourt or Santa Teresa to name but a few, that require an “educated” palate or can only be appreciated as an “acquired taste”. Their richness, layered complexity and depth are such that one sniff and sip will be enough to instantly win new converts. They are enough, in fact, as this article proves, to make evangelists out of some of us.

http://www.ministryofrum.com/index.php

http://www.theeldoradorum.com/

http://www.comstocksaloon.com/

Friday Fishwrap
Great Value Pinot Gris: A Dozen Make The Cut

Fri, 04 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Today’s blind tasting for the April Issue of Connoisseurs’ Guide consisted of sixteen Cabernet Sauvignons. The total value of the wine on the table was well north of $1,000 and two bottles carried price tags of $175. It got me to thinking about my recent encounter with Pinot Gris. Could I find a dozen recommendable Pinot Gris with a total value of less than $175. It turns out that the answer is yes.

Pinot Gris, also known as Pinot Grigio when it is grown in Italy, is mild, pleasant grape whose texture is typically round and a touch soft and whose flavors are simple but fruity. No one to my ken has ever ascribed noble characteristics to the grape. Yet, several of the best-selling wines in restaurants in America are made from this too little respected grape. It is time to set the record straighter.

Pinot Gris is popular because it is easy to drink, easy to pronounce, tastes good and costs little. There are producers who manage to get their prices pushed up (think Alsace’s Zind-Humbrecht), but they are few and far between. It may not be a noble grape, and is unlikely to ever reach the majesty of Riesling, with which it more or less competes head to head for sales, but people like it. Its popularity makes all the talk of Pinot Gris’ ordinariness into silliness. Wines that taste good, wines that people like, are not to be sneered at. And when it turns out that there are so many good wines at the affordable end of the price spectrum, well, that it is not to be sneered at either. Rather, it needs to be accepted for what it is—a simple wine that, at its best, is fun to drink.

Perhaps the operative word here is: Enjoy.

CHARLES SMITH The Honorable Washington State 2009 $12.00
Fresh, spry and insistently zesty with a real bent to citrus from beginning to end, this snappy young middle-weight tends ever so slightly to grapefruity bitterness as it goes. It is, however, a great, refreshing palate cleanser and will make a refreshing foil to simple fried fish and oysters alike.

CHATEAU STE. MICHELLE Columbia Valley 2009 $13.00
We find it hard to believe that its modest percent of Viognier can count for all that much, but this highly perfumed, lightly floral offering heads off on a less-than-conventional path even as its background suggestions of green peaches and stones keep it in the varietal realm. It is slightly supple and very well-scrubbed, and it will make a pleasant partner to grilled chicken.

COASTLINE Monterey County 2009 $10.00
Clean, a touch on the mild, minerally side and more Italianate than Alsatian in style, this mid-sized, slightly rounded version of the grape has a modest yet unmistakable layer of fruitiness at its heart and, if somewhat understated, is more than fairly priced.

CONCANNON Selected Vineyards Central Coast 2009 10.00
Leaning to sweetness and vaguely reminiscent of peaches, this very simple wine claims success by dint of its balance rather than any compelling character or depth. It needs a good chill, and it will not grow with aging but it is tasty enough stuff that is easy to take at the price.

CYCLES GLADIATOR California 2009 $11.00
Clean, quaffable and showing a modicum of peachy fruit, this simple, but well-balanced effort is smooth on the palate without being sloppy, and its intimations of sweetness are balanced by just the right touch of acid. It shows little in the way of richness or depth, but it is an eminently useful pre-prandial gulper.

FETZER California 2009 $9.00
If no more than quietly teasing with touches of peach-like fruit, this bottling is bright and alive and crisply balanced. It is more a palate refresher than a study in defined varietal character, but it will get the job done in settings where a light and lively white wine is needed. And, it does so at a very fair price.

FOREST GLEN Tehachapi Clone California 2009 $9.00
Fruit rather than sugar does the talking here, but the wine is reasonably fixed on varietal peaches. It is medium-bodied and does not thin out on the palate as happens with too many of its inexpensive cousins, and, if a long way from delivering true complexity, it is clean, slightly juicy and very easy to drink.

GEYSER PEAK California 2009 $12.00
A little withdrawn and a bit tight in feel it may be, but this wine is appropriately keyed on minerals, citrus, and green peaches, and it maintains a nice sense of fruit all the way through. On the palate, it begins with a nice bit of roundness then firms up and hangs on fairly well at the finish. We would not pour it as a foil to particularly flavorful foods, but it will wash down simple seafoods and milder poultry dishes with ease.

GNARLY HEAD California 2009 $11.00
There may be nothing at all complex or particularly rich about this simple white wine, and distinctive varietal character is not to be found, but it is clean, rounded and balanced, and it will certainly do the trick as an affordable partner to a variety of lighter seafoods.

J WINE COMPANY California 2009 $15.00
Hints of blossoms and peaches reach out from the light-medium volume aromas of this fairly full-bodied, very finely balanced look at Pinot Gris. Its early juice on the palate is set against a backdrop of stones and firming acidity, and if not a pure quaff, its light and lengthy flavors call for service with dishes like sole amandine or poached chicken napped with a tangy beurre blanc.

LOREDONA Monterey 2009 $11.00
If a little different from the rest, perhaps because of its unusual blend, this value-packed bottling is mildly suggestive of banana with a hint of peach and a slight flirtation with minerality. Seemingly sweet yet loaded with balancing acids, it is not ever going to be called "a classic". Yet, for those who do not mind paying $11 for an easy-drinking wine, it will turn out to be just the ticket when the gang comes to call.

THREE PEARS California 2009 $10.00
There is nothing remotely complex to be found in this very direct wine, but then that is something of which Pinot Grigio is rarely accused. It hits the mark as far as freshness and vitality are concerned, and it musters a smattering of clean, white peach fruitiness as it goes. A twist of last-minute citric bitterness does make an appearance, but its sins are minor and should surely go unnoticed when it is paired up with foods like Petrale sole.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
A Curmudgeon’s Take on The News of The Day

Thu, 03 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I like to take a break from writing and tasting by searching around the Internet for bits of newsworthy information that expand my knowledge or tickle my funny bone. Today I found a little of each.

Item 1: From the New Zealand Herald—A Quote From Randall Grahm

“It is more difficult to get rid of a case of Syrah than the clap.”

This by way of introduction to an article about why Syrah is going to become New Zealand’s third leading wine. Apparently folks are pulling out Cab. Sauv and Merlot and planting Syrah. No mention given to the fact that NZ Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot are not exactly anybody’s darlings.

Our Grade: B+. I always say that if you don’t have a good argument on your side, then throw in a quote from Mr. Grahm who is not only the most inventive winemaker around but also the most erudite and the funniest.

Item 2: “Ascentia Wine Estates Announces Changes to Buena Vista Carneros Production Buena Vista brand will include new varietals”

Okay. I looked at that headline and said to myself that it made sense to expand Buena Vista beyond its Pinot Noir and Chardonnay focus. But, the truth lies somewhere else. Here is what the underlying public relations release really says.

“Ascentia Wine Estates today announced it will consolidate production and expand grape sourcing for its Buena Vista wine brand. Buena Vista operations will be shifted to the Geyser Peak facility, another brand in the highly-rated Ascentia Wines portfolio. This decision will allow for a more efficient and streamlined production of Buena Vista wines. The transition will be completed within 45 to 60 days”.

Our Grade: B/D-. In these difficult economic times, it is difficult to criticize any business that tries to improve its failing lot in life. No complaint there. But, Buena Vista has been a southern Sonoma/Sonoma town stalwart for 150 years. Now it is no more. It will go from being a winery to being a brand, and keeping the so-called history winery is nothing more than a sham now that Buena Vista is leaving the area and will make its home an hour away in the Alexander Valley.

Item 3: Look-Alike Wines Featuring Look-Alike Marsupials Duke It Out

Kangaroo, Wallaby, What's the Difference?

This is a headline appearing recently in the Wall Street Journal. It made me laugh because I don’t much like pictures of animals on wine labels. Is the Duckhorn duck more meaningful than the Smoking Loon loon? How many family dogs have adorned labels over the years? Perhaps that makes me a bit of a curmudgeon, but when a couple of five dollar Aussie wines start duking it out, it is at least a little bit amusing.

Grade: One slightly soiled rat. It could have been worse. The soiled rat rating system does go up to three rats.

Item 4: More on The Great Roo/Wallaby Dustup

As loath as I am to crib from another writer, I just ran across Tom Johnson’s (http://excellentproj.com/) take on the big crisis down under and wished I had written those elegant words. To wit—

“That’s right: Australians are suing each other over who owns the rights to the large, bouncing rodent that is to Australia what the bald eagle is to the United States”.

Grade: A. Kudos for making a funny situation even more amusing.

Wine and Food Wednesday
More than One Wine

Wed, 02 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The idea that there is somehow a singularly “perfect” wine for each and every plate of food is a notion so silly that none who write about wine would embrace it, and, I would argue, that even making a case that one varietal can or will outshine all others as a foil for a given dish is similarly the stuff of folly. When we talk of food-and-wine complementarities, we talk of possibilities, not absolutes. It is easy enough to say this or that tastes good together, and it is of use to place a detour sign or two around matches that are proven pitfalls, but the possibilities for pleasure when pairing food and wine are next to infinite.

No, this is no wholesale embrace of culinary anarchy on my part, and, as I have written in the past, I do hold that there are some broadly defined lines it might be best to stay within (e.g. no Dover Sole with Syrah; no lamb shanks with Muscadet, thanks very much), but beyond the constraints necessarily imposed by high tannin, shrill acids, overt sugars or flaring alcohol, there is no question that there are a great many wines and wine styles that will afford delicious drinking with a particular dish. The joy of discovery in finding new food-and-wine affinities, is after all the real fun of what we do. I would not want to drink the same First-growth claret or Grand Cru Burgundy with the same dish night after night after night.

The point was driven home once again last Sunday night when I felt the need for a rich bowl of pasta, and, wanting something other than tomatoes, I remembered an Umbrian recipe based on porcini and sausage that had once pleased immensely. My own modest version of Julia Della Croce’s utterly delicious Spaghetti alla Norcina, which can be found in her splendid little volume Umbria: Regional Recipes from the Heartland of Italy published by Chronicle Books, combines lots of reconstituted dried Italian porcini, sautéed onions, sweet sausage, a bit of ground fennel, a bare pinch of red pepper and a good cup or more of heavy cream. It proved to be the perfect Sunday-night supper, but more memorable was the way in which the dish so effortlessly worked with a downright disparate bunch of wines.

In rounding up the usual suspects, Zinfandel was the first in the line-up, and the 2007 OAKVILLE Napa Valley was a predictable hit. Next-up, a just opened bottle of Adam Lee’s outstanding new 2009 SIDURI Keefer Ranch Pinot Noir made its way to the table, and, though Pinot had not been what I was thinking when combining porcini and sausage, the deep and oh-so-juicy, ripe-cherry fruit of this one was a marvelous mate to the Spaghetti’s savory richness. Around the time when a second bowl seemed appropriate, I noticed a 2004 IO Santa Barbara Syrah left corked on the sideboard from the evening before. Why not, I thought; never say never and all that. It turned out to be the big surprise of the evening, and whereas the pasta had provided bottom, a kind of basso support to the soaring, high-toned fruit of the Siduri Pinot, IO’s Syrah in turn did the same for the spaghetti, and the combination, beyond being marvelous, found the dish shape-shifting a bit.

It is not at all uncommon that we talk of how a wine changes as it opens and is influenced by various foods, but here was an instance where the food itself showed different facets and faces depending on just what was in the glass. Each of the wines showed exceptional balance. I do not know their alcohol levels and did not bother to look, but none were in any way overdone, and none could be simply described as being “sweet” or “savory”. They were all different and they all spoke with an individual voice, yet they were all perfect partners to the dish, and I would be in all truth be hard pressed to pick a favorite. The remembered dish is now tagged staple in my kitchen repertoire, and I am already wondering at the three or four bottles that might their make their ways to the table the next time it is served. This is going to be fun.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
A Prescription For Tasting Notes That Make Sense

Tue, 01 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is time for the members of the wine world to stop the incessant carping about tasting notes. Frankly, the minute that wine writing stops talking about wine and reactions to it will be the minute that wine conversation dies. Full stop.

Gerald Asher, whose otherwise brilliant talk to the Wine Writers Symposium instructed us all that good writing is studied writing, then took out after tasting notes. I can’t for the life of me understand why since Mr. Asher was once a writer of tasting notes. I remember him describing a wine as tighter than a string on a violin. I have loved and savored his very long discussions of wine and the people who made them in the late Gourmet magazine. True, it is hard to describe a three thousand word essay as a tasting note, but what else do you call an explanation of how wines he liked got to be the way they were. He may not have given points, and he may not even have described one specific wine, but, by the time he was finished, we had a taste in our mouths and he put it there. If those words do not constitute a form of extended tasting note, they are nothing but spots on a page.

Lately, Eric Asimov, the respected writer for the New York Times, had a word or three to say about tasting notes in his blog, The Pour, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/23/dining/23pour.html?_r=1, and he offered his idea about what they should contain.

When someone else’s blog makes the entire wine world stop and think, I get impressed. No matter whether I agree or disagree with the points being made, what matters is that Asimov has made me and lots of other writers think about what it is that we do. Later in this piece, I offer my own view on what makes up the essence of a good tasting note. Here are the words that have lately challenged folks like me.

“I’m not one to go overboard in describing the myriad aromas and flavors in a glass of wine. In fact, most of the gaudy descriptions found in tasting notes will not help a whit to understand the character of a bottle of wine or to anticipate the experience of drinking it.

“While it may seem heretical to say, the more specific the description of a wine, the less useful information is actually transmitted. See for yourself. All you have to do is compare two reviewers’ notes for a single bottle: one critic’s ripe raspberry, white pepper and huckleberry is another’s sweet-and-sour cherries and spice box. What’s the solution? Well, if you feel the urgent need to know precisely what a wine is going to taste like before you sniff and swallow, forget it. Experience will give you a general idea, but fixating on exactitude is a fool’s errand. Two bottles of the same wine can taste different depending on when, where and with whom you open them.

“But the general character of a wine: now, that’s another matter. A brief depiction of the salient overall features of a wine, like its weight, texture and the broad nature of its aromas and flavors, can be far more helpful in determining whether you will like that bottle than a thousand points of detail. In fact, consumers could be helped immeasurably if the entire lexicon of wine descriptors were boiled down to two words: sweet or savory”.

Mr. Asimov is onto something here. In writing, “if you need to know precisely what a wine is going to taste like before you sniff and swallow”, and he might have well added, before you buy it, “forget it”, makes the point that words are an imperfect way to describe taste sensations. On that, he will get no argument from me. Wine is a complex product, and, at best, we are able only to suggest reasonable analogies of its precise character. But the solution of boiling the experience down to two words, “sweet or savory” is not solution at all either. It is too general to be helpful, and one needs to remember that Asimov does ask that wine descriptions, aka “tasting notes”, contain “a brief description of the salient features of a wine”. And, it is that latter point, and not savory or sweet, that has set me thinking about what ought to be contained in a good wine description.

Entire books have been written about the tasting experience, and this is a blog, not a book or even a short story, so forgive me if I don’t offer an entire screed on the subject. Still, there are, it seems to me, some basic things required of any wine description and lots of optional items that a thoughtful writer will use or not use as the wine demands. To wit—

Intensity of the Aromas—This is the very first thing that hits me when I taste a wine. Not what it smells like but how intense those aromas are.

General Aspect of the Aromas—Are they fruity or not? Asimov’s “sweet or savory” is one way to approach this concern, but the basic fact is that wine starts with fruit, and regardless of what else a wine might offer, it will either capture fruit or not. If not fruity, then what? Dry? Rich? Earthy? Spicy? Oaky? The possibilities are too many to mention, but the basics ought to be the basics. We may not, as Asimov suggests, agree on the gaudy specifics, but it is unusual for a group of good tasters to mistake earth for fruit or stones for oak or richness for minerality. Besides, even if we differ, the idea is that my tasting notes reflect my sense of what I am experiencing. A respected critic will not make basic mistakes.

Varietal Adherence—Most grapes can produce a range of characteristics around some sort of norm, and those norms have been discussed for years, even centuries. Cabernet Sauvignon smells of currants and black cherries, sometimes of graphite and black olives, other times of raspberry, but it rarely smells of dried spices, peaches or anise. A good tasting note will sometimes simply refer to those often accepted descriptors and at other times will speak directly to varietal adherence. Some of those characteristics might be called sweet and others savory, and often a good Cabernet-based wine will have both. Words may be imprecise, but we cannot run away from the value of speaking to varietal adherence.

Conformance to Expected Norms for A Given Location—We know that Cabernets of the West Rutherford Bench have a certain mix of richness, fruit and depth. Whether we call it Rutherford dust or tea leaves or dried currants, we know it when we experience it. Not every tasting note needs to delve deeply into the presence of expected “terroir” influences but a good description will speak to that point when necessary either because a wine like Staglin has captured it in spades or another wine has gone completely off the rails.

Weight and Texture—Here again, Asimov takes us beyond mere sweet and savory. He calls for comments on these points and I agree right down the line. Virtually every tasting note in Connoisseurs’ Guide discusses these essential aspects of the wine. They are central to our experience, and they do not vary with aeration. A full-bodied wine is a full-bodied wine. Alum-like tannins are alum-like tannins. Soft wines, whether they are enjoyable or execrable, are still soft wines.

Flavors—A complex concept, this, and one that goes far beyond the flavor profile of the wine. It may or may not require a string of adjectives, but it certainly requires a discussion of the way the wine’s flavors interact with acidity, tannin and every other influence that is experienced with the wine on the palate. Length, depth, range, even beauty and grandeur are ultimately experienced in the mouth. Alder Yarrow on his excellent blog, Vinography, just recently described a wine as “swirl(ing) in a dazzling electric silk river down your tongue”. OK, I get it. I would not use those words. Asimov might describe them as “gaudy”, and Gerald Asher might have written them in his tasting note writing days but would not now. Still, I know what Yarrow is talking about. It is texture and flavor and richness all rolled into one. And I believe that tasting notes, especially for wines one loves, really do need to show some excitement as a way of making the whole tasting experience come alive.

Finish and Aging Potential—These are admittedly two concepts in one construct, but it is often how a wine finishes that reveals its potential to age. Does the finish linger? Is it tight, hard and impenetrable? Does it ultimately convince me that the wine has a chance to improve with bottle age and proper cellaring? Finish is an observation. Aging potential is a judgment, a guess, a bit of pontification at times. Yet, a good description gives the reader a sense, as imprecise as such comments may be, of the taster’s expectations based on his total experience with the wine, especially including the character and quality of the finish.

Balance—One could put balance first, in the middle or here towards the end of the list, because balance is everywhere. Do the many facets of the nose balance or does one aspect overwhelm all else? Does acidity balance fruit, sweetness, intensity? Do the tannins fit well or do they stand out? What will happen to balance over time in a wine that is a candidate for the cellar?

How Much Pleasure Does/Will The Wine Afford—When you get right down to it, all discussions about individual wines, and even about specific producers, at some point must answer not just descriptive questions but the ultimate qualitative question. How good is this wine, this producer? Whether one answers that question with three stars, one hundred points, the ten-chopstick method, letter grades or any other symbolic or word-driven hierarchy, the reader wants to know, needs to know how good the wine is.

One can attempt to do all this in twenty-five words like the Wine Spectator, in forty to sixty words like the Wine Enthusiast, in fifty to one-hundred fifty words like Connoisseurs’ Guide or in three thousand words like Gerald Asher, whose essays might never answer any of the specific points above but whose words still convey immense amounts of meaning. But, do it we must because wine is no simple, “toss it down the gullet” potion. Not at the level that thee and me experience it.

Monday Manifestos
The Great Drinking and Driving Debate

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It happens to me all the time. Someone brings up the subject of “high alcohol” wines being undrinkable, not because of anything else with the wine but its alcohol level exceeds some magic number that someone told them is too high. I counter with the argument that balance is everything and thin wines at 12% alcohol will taste hotter than deeply draughted, balanced wines at 15%. I know this to be true because it plays itself out in the Connoisseurs’ Guide tastings again and again.

At some point in the conversation, the focus changes, usually at the point that the anti-over 14% forces realize that they cannot win the argument on organoleptic grounds. At that point, they haul out the big guns. Big Gun No. 1 is the argument that they cannot have a second glass of wine at 14% because they will (a) get tipsy (b) fall asleep in their plate of pasta and red sauce or (c) forget where they parked their car. Now we can all agree that someone can drink more volume of a wine at 11% alcohol than they can of a wine at 16% alcohol. No one is going to dispute that fact.

But where that argument falls down is that most table wines, and let’s specify that we are talking about California for the moment, run in the 13% to 14.5% range. Moreover, very few red wines of any consequence measure even as low as 11.5% to 12%, so the only choice for truly lower alcohols are whites, typically with some sweetness in their makeups. Nothing wrong with that. A fine Riesling at 10.5% made slightly sweet and built with plenty of natural acidity can go with all kinds of foods.

What happens, however, when one wants to eat pasta with red sauce or a leg of lamb or a rib roast? Then the choice is rarely going to be one of the slightly sweet aromatic whites no matter how good it is or even given the fact, for me at least, that my favorite grape in the world is Riesling. And if the choice is then a medium-to full-bodied red, the alcohol is going to be somewhere north of 12%, probably north of 13% and very often above 14%. I personally don’t choose wine by alcohol level but by taste. Good wine tastes good, and it will be in balance such that the difference between 13% and 14.5% (the range that is most seen at Connoisseurs’ Guide tastings and the most likely range for recommended wines) is simply not enough difference to worry about.

And then out comes Big Gun No. 2. “How often do you drive drunk?” I will be asked as if somehow not being willing to be limited to low-alcohol wines makes me and every one else who does not espouse that narrow line into inebriates.

So here is my stand on drinking and driving. With all the literature about body size, consuming alcohol with food and all the other considerations, I have a pretty good sense of what it takes to approach the legal driving limit. But, I have no ability to judge whether I am under or over that limit if I am close to it at all. And because there is no rule that says one has to drink half a bottle of wine with dinner, I have two choices. The first is to not drink a half bottle of wine, and the second is to let someone else drive.

The bottom line is that alcohol is alcohol but moderation is moderation, and there is precious little difference in what happens to blood alcohol concentrations based on the different levels of alcohol in most wines. Anyone who says he or she can drink three glasses of 13% wine and not be intoxicated but will get snockered on three glasses of 14.5% wine is simply fooling themselves. And the ultimate weapon in discussions of wine and alcohol is the drunk driving argument.

Now drunk driving or DUI or “drink-driving” as the Brits call it is a serious issue. But it is not the reason to shy away from a wine that serves your palate well. Moderation and designated drivers are called for regardless of the per cent alcohol in the wine. In rejecting the false notion that one can consume copious quantities of the one but not of the other, I come down squarely on the side of “you can’t drink a lot and drive regardless of the alcohol level”. So, please, keep talking about the issue of alcohol in wine, but also please, don’t raise the red herring of drinking and driving. Anyone who is smart about how much they drink and under what circumstances need not worry about what the label says. Anyone who thinks they do not have to worry about how much and under what circumstances because they are drinking wine with 12% alcohol is far more of danger than the rest of us.

Friday Fishwrap
Intolerance in the Wine Blogosphere

Fri, 25 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There has always been a fair bit of argy-bargy in the wine blogosphere. Newbies attack the old boys. Story tellers attack tasting note writers. Everyone attacks the Wine Spectator and Robert Parker. People with some sort of certificate from one of the several credentialing agencies attack those who have learned their wine knowledge through study and tasting and years of experience. Bloggers who have no ties to the established Print journals attack those esteemed publications as being dead but not knowing it.

Hey, it’s a free country, and the Internet knows no bounds. Perhaps this week is no different from any other week; it just seems that way because somehow CGCW is at the center of some of the bitching. And sad to say, it has gone both ways. I’ll get to my sins in a minute, but a comment over on SteveHeimoff.com from one professional writer and strong internet presence to Heimoff who is also a strong presence on the Internet as well as in print has got me to thinking that perhaps there is a full moon out and we just don’t know it.

Heimoff reported on a luncheon he had with Corie Brown, who was a speaker at the Wine Writers Symposium. Ms. Brown, who served for years as winewriter for the Los Angeles Times and now is a driving force (perhaps the driving force) behind the well-regarded online journal, Zester Daily, spoke about her techniques for conducting an interview. Mr. Heimoff felt that she did not go far enough and seems to have said so to her face over lunch. But according to Ms. Brown, he got some of his facts wrong in reporting the conversation in his blog yesterday. Ms. Brown left the following comment, “Steve, you are misrepresenting what I said to you over lunch as well as misquoting me. Very poor professional standards. Is this the way you treat your interview subjects? I have to say I’m disappointed in you.”

Now, my point here is not to judge what happened. I know Steve Heimoff to be a consummate professional, but maybe his memory was faulty or he just misunderstood what was said. I have no way of knowing. But, I wonder why Ms. Brown could not have found a way to express her disappointment without using terms like “poor professional standards”.

It happened to CGCW this week as well, and I was both on the receiving end and on the intolerant end. I will say here and now, it should not have happened. That it did happen is at least partly caused by someone trying to capture an issue in 140 characters on Twitter. In the end, it was all my misunderstanding, which is exactly what seems to have happened to Ms. Brown and Mr. Heimoff.

Last Thursday, CGCW ran a column called: Can Wine Blogging Survive? The details of the column can be found in the Blog archives for Thursdays. It was not an appraisal of blogs good and bad or of established writers versus newcomers. It simply said, among other things, that some of the new entrants will make it and some will not. Some will stay around because they love blogging and others will eventually find it too much work for the little rewards they are getting and go back to their day jobs.

On Friday, I ran into a mention of the column on Twitter in which the tweet suggested that a food fight had broken out between me and the wine blogosphere, and the tweet used the word “naysayer”. My dander got up, and I sent a not entirely kind message to the tweetster, who happens to be a professional colleague. I complained about his categorization. It now turns out that he was simply “re tweeting” the comments from elsewhere. My bad. But . . . . .

In the meantime, I went over to the blog in question. It is called Wine For Normal People and found that its maker had categorized the column about blog survival as being filled with “blog hatred”. It took a couple of exchanges, in civil tones, thank you, between me and Normal People to set the matter straight. But, here again, something went wrong in the communication. I get that the blogger felt offended, but she did not need to be, and I wish she had done something softer like asking me a direct question in the CGCW comments column.

I noted above that I am not without sin in the area of bitchiness, and so I am casting stones at myself in equal measure as I am to anyone else. It seems to me that we all need to be able to speak our minds, and it further seems to me that when someone gets his or her nose out of joint, the proper response is to try find out why rather than to go on the attack. Words not spoken face to face can too often be misinterpreted, and it might do us all a lot of good if we could make the blogosphere less bitchy.

End of today’s sob story.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
All The News That’s Fit To Spit

Thu, 24 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Sometimes the news is just too good to ignore. Sometimes it is just too funny or too ironic to ignore. And sometimes it is just news. Consider the following.

Item: Truck Full of Wine Burns on I-80 in Iowa

Seems like a truck full of wine from Oregon was sitting overnight at an off-ramp in Iowa when its refrigeration unit caught fire. The drivers escaped but not before being burned in the process, and that is not funny. But what caught my eye and begs for an answer is what was the refrigeration unit doing in mid-winter in Iowa? It should have been even faster asleep than the drivers.

Item: Pennsylvania Lawmakers Says “No” to Privatization of Liquor Sales

My first reaction was “so what’s new”? When has any government ever given up a good source of revenue except possibly the U. S. when it cut taxes and helped create a larger Federal deficit? Well, no State is about to go that route in these difficult times, and that is the major reason that Representative Kevin Murphy cites when he says that the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board brings in $400 million to the State coffers every year. Somehow, he did not get around to talking about what the citizens of his state feel when they cannot get the wine they want and have to pay more for whatever it is that the State does sell. I need to add that I have visited those Pennsylvania stores and was impressed that they seemed reasonably well run. On the other hand, without competition, they have no real reason to get better and no real reason to offer the kinds of services that a small, dedicated wine merchant can offer.

Item: Dan Berger Gets One Right

I kid my friend Dan because he is one of the most opinionated, outspoken people in the wine world and because some of his ideas are too narrow for my taste. But Dan is also a very smart guy with a good imagination and sense of vision. In a recent article, Dan commented about the Vintners Hall of Fame in Napa. Its 2011 induction ceremony for its honorees happened last Monday, and some very fine and deserving people were inducted. It has not always been thus because the first couple of years seemed to be more of a Napa popularity contest than a serious attempt to honor the folks who truly have made the great contributions to California wine. What Dan has done is to pen a very polite column reminding us that the Vintners Hall of Fame continues to miss out on some of the most deserving folks. Just to name a couple whom Dan mentioned and for whom I agree: Fred McCrea whose Stony Hill was one of the great Chardonnays back fifty years ago when there was no Chadonnay (listed at less than100 acres and lumped in among “Other Reds” in the grape survey of the time). And Robert Lawrence Balzer. Mr. Balzer is among the people who created the category of wine writer in the United States. We would have got there without him, but we would not have got there as early or as well. I have seen nominations to the Hall over the years of much younger and less accomplished writers. Dan is right. Robert Lawrence Balzer belongs in the Vintners Hall of Fame.

And on a personal note, Robert Parker, whatever else anyone thinks of him, has had a profound effect on the way wine is perceived, talked about, written about in this country. He has been on the ballot but does not get enough votes. And I suspect that some of it is personal. Dan did not mention Mr. Parker. I don’t mind adding his name myself.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Petit Sirah: Let Me Count the Ways

Wed, 23 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

There is nothing endearing about Petite Sirah. It is the journeyman prize-fighter of the wine world replete with a broken nose, a couple of cauliflower ears and a blank stare. It is a brute, and I have always thought that a winemaker who chose to pursue it would be advised to do so with a whip, a chair and a gun. I remember with fondness a handful of bottlings some thirty-five or forty years back; Ridge, Freemark Abbey, David Bruce, Carneros Creek and Mount Veeder come to mind, but that was a long time ago, and I do worry that just maybe the wines have grown far better in memory than they really were at the time. And, other than matching them up with the heartiest, most rustic meat dishes, their utility at the table came with real limits…but I must admit that things seem to be changing.

At the end of last week, I dropped by Rock Wall Wine Company in Alameda for the “Dark and Delicious” food and wine tasting presented by the Petite Sirah Advocacy Organization. I was surprised. Not only were there more than a few very interesting Petite Sirahs that showed an entirely different, more refined face, a good many of them paired up brilliantly with dishes that I would have not thought would work. Oh, there were the usual awkward attempts to pair tannic-beast bottlings with dark chocolate (I am still far from convinced), but what struck me most was the remarkable affinity that the more carefully crafted wines had with a array of richer pork preparations.

I admit to running out of time before I tasting all the wines and foods offered, but highlights of the former included new efforts from Brown Estate, Robert Biale, Miro, Robert Fulton and Vina Robles. While solid and sturdy, the wines as a whole steered clear of the brutal astringency that is Petite’s common failing, and they showed fine balance and real fruity depth while still being weighty and rich.

Skewers of well-seasoned smoked pork and savory pork-and-dried-cherry tartlets turned out to be delicious foils to wines’ lush, blackberry fruit, and a slow-cooked Yucatan Pork seasoned with achiote and limes was, for me, the biggest hit of the evening.

I am reminded of a rejoinder from Tom Pellechia who cautioned “never say never” when I recently wrote about the difficulties in pairing dry red wine and chocolate, and, if I remain unmoved in my pessimism for that particular marriage, I will gladly concede that my preconceptions about Petite Sirah and its place at the table are substantially changed. This time at least, there were rewards aplenty for putting aside my inclinations of “never”.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Why Millennials Don't Read Wine Blogs or Tasting Notes

Tue, 22 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Connoisseurs’ Wine Blog is not yet six months old, and it does not get the traffic that the popular folks have begun to enjoy. But, it must be doing something right because increasingly, it is getting postings from Millennials who tell me that blogging is dead and I am too old to know it.

Last night, we were visited by someone using the nom de plume of Sippingsister. I personally prefer folks to post under their own names, but there is no way to police that desire so folks like “sister” and the ubiquitous “Anonymous” are perfectly free to stop by.

Sister’s contribution was actually much appreciated. She left this food for thought, and she succeeded—with me at least. I followed the link and very much enjoyed what I found there.

I think blogs will be the tree falling in the forest. And it may not take 10 years -- see this from nytimes
http://tinyurl.com/5vqxp67

What you will find at the link is a very well-written article by Verne Kopytoff entitled, “Blogs Wane as the Young Drift to Sites Like Twitter”. But what you will find when you read the whole article is that Mr. Kopytoff, who may not have made up the headline (believe me when I tell you that my short life as a newspaper columnist resulted in some of the most convoluted titles for my articles I could ever imagine) actually is trying to tell us that the young are not like the rest of us. Now, aside from the fact that I am beginning to wonder how old Mr. Kopytoff actually is, he does eventually come around to the truth.

It is the young, the Millennials, who have given up blogging. Apparently it takes too much energy. It is too hard. One young women went so far as to say that she likes a social media site where all she has to do is put up her pictures. The actual writing of words was getting in the way. The reality is that the young turn out to be fans of Twitter and Facebook, and any diminution in the number of blogs in existence is laid at their doorstep. Oldies like the rest of us apparently still remember how to write because blogging by people over 34 has continued to rise.

How is it, you are asking, that I have somehow conflated the news about the blogging patterns of children with their disdain for wine reviews? Well, the answer is not scientific. Rather, if one does read the various wine blogs, it become pretty easy to spot the Millennials. They are the ones telling us that wine reviews do not matter; that journalism as we have known it is dead; that the NY Times has no idea how it is going to survive and other silliness that gets posted from time to time on blogs written by established writers.

Well, I have an answer for my esteemed young friends. Some years ago, when I was their age and surviving the Summer of Love here in San Francisco, our favorite mantra was “Never trust anyone over 30”. And then something unforeseen at the time happened. We turned thirty.

Some of us bought a house in the suburbs, raised 2.2 soccer players and then turned forty. And along the way, our middle-classishness and our palates led us into the arena of the wine aficionados. I was thirty-five when I built my first wine cellar in the back of our garage. And I am not alone. Old rockers now own wineries and vineyards. Old hippies now work in tasting rooms.

And when those Millennials do turn thirty and forty, which I can assure them that they will, they too are going to like blogs and wine reviews. I had one of them in the house just today. Not so long ago, he was a bike messenger in San Francisco. Now he lives across the way, has one son so far and owns his own business. So, I am not worried about the Millennials. They make think my way of life is dead, but they will discover otherwise. It is just going to take a few years. In the meantime, if they keep drinking wine, they too may turn out to be wine bloggers.

Monday Manifestos
Drink Like A President

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Tomorrow is Presidents’ Day, and I am determined to drink like a President. Throughout history, many of our Presidents have been winelovers, and, while I don’t know much about the drinking habits of our first two Presidents, it is pretty well recorded history that Thomas Jefferson not only had a big stash of Bordeaux bottlings but that he also grew grapes at Monticello.

In our recent history, perhaps no one did more with wine than Richard Nixon. His service of Schramsberg bubbles to the Chinese communists on the occasion of his successful ping-pong diplomacy pretty much propelled that winery to fame early in its existence. But Nixon was not called “Tricky Dick” for nothing. At fancy dinners in the White House, his wine was always kept separate from that served to the other guests. And as the story goes, while his guests where enjoying a nice, comfortable claret, Tricky Dick was drinking Chateau Margaux. Now, there are those who hate Nixon for Watergate. Not me. I am upset at the man for bogarting the Margaux.

Of course, California wine was not always a regular at the White House, although I am proud to say that the White House commissary has had a subscription to Connoisseurs’ Guide for decades. It really took until Ronald Reagan arrived on the scene for that to change. He brought in his own wine steward, a wine retailer from Sacramento (where Reagan had been Governor) named David Berkeley. It was Mr. Berkeley who gave California wines an even break.

If one can find someone at Beaulieu with a long memory, the old timers having all fled or been sent packing under corporate management, it will not be long before the name Leigh Knowles comes up. Mr. Knowles used to mention quietly but often that ten different President’s has enjoyed Beaulieu Georges de Latour Private Reserve Cabernet. Not that I don’t like Margaux, but my first choice for dinner tonight is going to be from Beaulieu. If the wine is good enough for ten Presidents, it is good enough for me. The most recent vintage, 2007, rated two stars/93 points. That is also good enough for me.

I have a couple of other thoughts for you. Boeger Zinfandel is reportedly (reported by the Boeger winery) to be the first Zinfandel served at the White House. It is certainly less expensive than the Beaulieu. And if you cannot find Boeger Zin, do remember that for years, Zinfandel was called “California’s grape” because we could not trace its European roots or its passage to California.

There is a winery in Napa, in the Oak Knoll District, called Corley. The Corley winery is designed to look like Monticello and the winery has a label called Monticello Vineyards complete with a Jefferson Cuvée Cabernet Sauvignon.

And if the Jefferson name appeals, then consider Jefferson Reserve bourbon, a well-aged, rich and smooth potion that is among our favorite “Kentucky Merlots”—if I may borrow the nomenclature used by the Louisville Juice blog.

Happy President’s Day, everyone. I hope you don’t have to work, but I am guessing that most people do except for the Post Office.

Sunday Serendipity
A Question Is Posed—We Have Answers

Sun, 20 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Over on his eponymously named blog, Steve Heimoff asks the following prescient question:

WHAT WILL THOSE Robert Parker CRACKHEADS DO NOW THAT RP IS NO LONGER REVIEWING CA WINE?

At CGCW, we think we know the answer, and have informed Steve of it. And in case you are also interested in our riveting ribaldry, here it is.

Steve–

Thanks for a little chuckle on yet another raw, gray day. I am sitting here pondering the question. Quite a little challenge you have posed for us.

And I think I know some of the answers. We might need help from a professional pollster to actually find out, but absent that, here are some of the possibilities:
     – Go into exile in South America
     – Start their own blogs
     – Purchase subscriptions to the Rush Limbaugh Review of Intoxicants
     – Become Steve Heimoff crackheads
     – Join 90-Point Addicts Anonymous

Why Has Alcohol Become A Dirty Word

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Let’s accept this one fact: Wine has alcohol. We cannot change that fact. And when we run around with our heads in our hands bemoaning this alcohol level or that, we encourage the world to think that alcohol is a dirty word.

Lately, of course, there is an even dirtier word, and it is screamed from the highest rooftops as if some crime against nature had been committed. That word/phrase is: Over 14% alcohol. It gets as silly as this. One poster on a popular blog complemented the writer for posting alcohol levels in the various wines he was reviewing. Never mind that stated alcohol levels on bottles may or may not be accurate given the latitude allowed the wineries and greater latitude taken by wineries in the absence of any action by any governing body to determine whether or not those stated alcohols are true, almost true or way beyond the allowed tolerances.

Having thanked the blogger for his openness about alcohol, she then went on to say that she was a small person and she no longer drank any wine over 14% stated alcohol because she would get drunk on one glass whereas she could consume half a bottle of lower alcohol wines. Well, we all know that the difference to our bodies between wines at 13.5% and 14.3% is fairly negligible since it amount to less than an ounce of alcohol in a half bottle’s worth of consumption.

It’s easy to tell ourselves that she was wrong, a victim of the dirty word campaign and to dismiss her as a small blip. But it less easy when one reads the newest issue of Decanter Magazine. In it, Steven Brook, who has made himself into their English expert on California wine, has penned an article lambasting (and not all that incorrectly) the issue of alcohol labeling and the problem, as he sees it, of alcohol levels in California wine. Now, Mr. Brook, who is a fine man and esteemed colleague, is certainly entitled to his opinion, especially since so much of what he has written is unassailable.

But consider this. Decanter, in the same magazine, reviews a large swath of 2006 California Cabernet Sauvignons and comes up with recommendations for wine as high as 15.6% alcohol. I frankly can’t find much fault with a set of recommendations that include, among other items, the Staglin 2006 and the Chappellet 2006 Pritchard Hill Estate Vineyard bottlings. Both are superb, deep and have alcohols that Steven Brook and the alcohol-level doomsaysers would find damnable.

So here is what I have concluded (again, thank you). The “it must be under 14% crowd” talk a good game, but they are not tasting wine when they spout their dirty word lyrics. Because, when a crowd of them, including the snooty English who have often spoken unkindly of California Cabs in the past, come up against a balanced, nicely rendered set of wines, they like them. And they like them because they are tasting the wine, not looking at the label.

It is not alcohol level by itself that is the dirty word in wine. It is the lack of balance. It is the loss of fruit in the search for intensity. It is the prunes and raisins. You will get no argument from me if you criticize those things in wine. But alcohol at 14%? Stop talking and start tasting.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Wine Blogging: Can It Survive?

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is said that there are 3,000 wine blogs wandering around the Internet. All are given away for free. Most of them are worth what you pay for them. Many will never make a nickel for their creators, and that's OK with most of them because they started out blogging for the fun of it. But, there are still hundreds of wine blogs whose authors hope to stay in the winewriting business for a long time. They won't.

It is not that they should not try or that some will not make a go of it. That is how CGCW was born back in the early 1970s when a couple of amateurs with growing wine collections decided to try their hands at reporting on California wine. It worked for us back then, and I am grateful and entirely pleased that my life has worked out the way it did. But, will 3,000 or even 300 new entrants to field have the same good fortune. Some will; most will not.

Steve Heimoff, whose blog is among of my very favorites and is one of the first one I turn to every day because it is so well-written, has addressed this issue of "monetization of the wine blog" today, and it set me to thinking. His essay is far too long to quote here, but I recommend that you have a look at it over at SteveHeimoff.com. In it, he essentially says that bloggers are going to leave the field if the reading public does not eventually agree to pay for their favorites. They will simply go elsewhere according to the Heimoff thesis.

The Olken thesis is only a little bit different. Those who love what they are doing and don't care about not getting paid for it, or maybe making a pittance based on a few paid advertisements, will stay around. The majority of the "toe-in-the-water" entrants, however, will get tired and go back to their day jobs. Others will undoubtedly take their place, and, in the Olken view, there will always be a large number of enthusiastic amateurs-some of whom will go on to become part of the next generation of pros.

For the currant pros, it is a different kettle of fish. People like Steve Heimoff, Paul Greggutt, Jon Bonne, Eric Asimov, Tom Wark, your CGCW editors will stay around because blogging is part of being relevant in the age of the new media. That certainly is why the CGCW blog came about. The Internet cries out for more information because the cost of creating that information in electronic print is not very high. The cost of finding something to write about is, however, very high, and while it cannot be measured in dollars for wine and press startups, it is measured in years and years of preparation. That is why most of the blogs that get featured in our Tuesday feature, Best of Blogs, whose intent is to recognize and bring you examples of the great writing of the past week, are written not by enthusiastic amateurs but by professionals who have earned their spurs. It is not intentional. It just works out that way.

There are, of course, interesting startups, and their takes on things can sometimes be more insightful than the pros because we sometimes are too close to the trees to see the forest. Joe Roberts, 1WineDude, the folks at Enobytes, Jeff Lefevere at Good Grape and even Brooklyn Wine Guy whose distaste for California wine bothers me but whose writing often talks of falling in love, for an evening at least, with one very good wine are all examples of folks who have turned to winewriting. And there are others.

But, those good folks mentioned above are going to be challenged by their own sense of purpose at some point. They are working very hard to make the leap into the realm of the professionals. In terms of their writing, they are doing just fine. Whether they will be happy in the long run working hard for less than a reasonable reward is the central issue in the Heimoff piece. He is less optimistic than I am that some folks will stay the course. And I am not very optimistic about their chances of earning a living at blogging, but I foresee the blog continuing to exist for both pros and new entrants to the field.

Wine and Food Wednesday
The End of “Anything But Chardonnay” Talk

Wed, 16 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Those who like to talk about wine do not talk about Chardonnay. It is not a word that will get them excited and is not likely to be the catalyst to animated discussion. It will, in fact, too often earn a sideways look of derision for the one who brings it up at all, and, I for one just don’t get it. I happen to like the stuff, even if I admit to not drinking a great deal of it.

Ah, you say, it’s that absence no doubt makes the heart grow fonder, but I simply tend cook dishes that are more comfortable with something red. When the menu calls for a rich white, I do not subscribe to the mindless “Anything But Chardonnay” mantra offered up by those well-meaning souls who would protect us from ourselves. Yes, I do like Chardonnay, and what is more, I like it made in a great many styles. And, if the recipe is warrants, I even like it when (gasp!) big, ripe and oaky. Now my heresy is complete.

I do not consider myself a crusader for the varietal. I am usually content to quietly find my own pleasures in a glass or two, and its place in the market proves that it does not need my help -- that it is immune from the barbs of its too many detractors. I do not make it a habit of standing up and singing its praise, but I enjoyed a particularly good meal on Valentine’s day at Albany’s Nizza la Bella that was made downright memorable thanks to a couple of very good Chardonnays. Fire-Roasted Mussels with Pastis and a deeply flavored, intensely aromatic Herb-Basted Chicken took the lead at the table, and the 2007 Alysian Cresta Ridge Vineyard Taurin Block from winemaker Gary Farrell and the 2008 Pahlmeyer Napa Valley were the two Chardonnays.

These two wines head off in dramatically different directions, and each found its special place in the night. The sleek, firmly structured, still youthful Alysian was a fine foil to the savory roasted mussels, and, if it seemed a bit taut when matched with the chicken, the full-throated, big-bodied Pahlmeyer did the trick with the main course. In fact, the richly seasoned roasted chicken could have easily handled a red wine, and any lesser white wine would have withered when paired with so savory a dish. A real revelation came as the Pahlmeyer found amazing affintity to the roasted, not-too-sweet acorn squash that accompanied our poulet. Hand-cut, double-fried frites mounded over a silky aioli proved a fine match to both bottlings, as was the La Bianca al Quattro Fromagio Funghis, fire-roasted mushrooms and meld of cheeses.

There are no perfect, one-of-a-kind wine and food pairings to be sure, but the ones that we enjoyed with Nizza la Bella’s southern French food were remarkably good. A few of the longing looks meant solely for my valentine over pre-dinner cocktails were later shared with the wines at the table, and the evening turned out to be all that Valentine’s Day should be.

91 ALYSIAN Cresta Ridge Vineyard Taurin Block Chardonnay Russian River Valley 2007 $38.00
From the very first sniff through to its long, crisply balanced finish, this vital, carefully structured young wine exhibits a particularly fine sense of proportion as regards its mix of perfectly ripened apples, toast and creamy oak. As rich as it may be, however, it possesses a real sense of refinement and grace, and, while there should be no absolutely doubts about its ability to grow into better with time, we admit that it will be tempting to pull a few corks early on.
Reviewed: November 2009

90 PAHLMEYER Chardonnay Napa Valley 2008 $70.00
There is no mistaking the Pahlmeyer hand here as ripeness, rich oak and very deep fruit come together in a wine with a big, full-throated Chardonnay voice. It is not long on manners just now, and it is bothered by a bit of finishing coarseness, but with this kind of sheer fruity substance, it leaves no doubt whatsoever as to its ability to improve significantly with age. In fact, we would lobby for twelve months of patience and let it settle down just a bit before pouring it as a partner to rich and savory dishes such as duck and quail.
Reviewed: October 2010

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
A Couple of Winners

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

When we conceived of “Best of The Blogs”, the idea was to celebrate all the good writing in the wine blogosphere, and on most Tuesdays, that is exactly what we have done. The blogosphere is a sort of free form, “y’all come”, town hall for wine commentary, and if some of it seems to make little sense, well, that is what happens when everyone gets their say. But, something else happens. People with interesting ideas who usually do not have a newspaper or magazine gig turn up with lots to say that is interesting, informative and occasionally just downright funny. Today’s “Best of” column recognizes two such recent efforts by knowledgeable wine folks who, absent the blogosphere, would be a lot harder to be heard from. Sit back and enjoy because these bad boys are about to take you on a wild ride.

Louisville Juice is written by crusty Tom Johnson from, you guessed it, Louisville, Kentucky—a place he readily admits is “not exactly the center of the wine universe, but oh well”. Louisville Juice is Mr. Johnson’s outlet for his pithy observations of the wine world, and if most of his work comes in short bursts, it does not take long to figure out that this blog is must-read material for anyone who needs a spot of sardonic brightness in his day. I must fall into that category because I read Louisville Juice and enjoy it.

Typically, I would now direct you to the blog in question, but, with apologies for appropriating Mr. Johnson’s writings without permission, I want to make sure you do not miss a word, hence I have reproduced his comments on wine and food in Chile here. (Cribbed from http://excellentproj.com/)

“I have previously discussed both bathing in wine and drinking wine with breakfast. Today, we get word that Chilean hoteliers have combined the two in a wine-and-oatmeal bath:

“They put about half a bottle of Carmenere red wine (Carmenere is native to Chile and it’s the region’s finest) in the tub, fill it halfway with mineral water and bubble bath. They also throw in candles and a glass of Carmenere for you to sip on while you relax. Oh, and I can’t forget the oats soaking in the tub, as well as dry oats by your glass of wine. The oats blend perfectly with the red wine bath and, as you know, naturally exfoliate. Amazing.

“I’ve never really bonded with a Camenere, so pouring it on naked tourists seems as good a use for it as I can think of. Still, the very post-modern tendency to combine disparate elements makes me wonder if maybe the inevitable result isn’t a spa treatment like this:

“Feel the tension leave your body as the masseuse gently exfoliates your skin with pomace, the 100% organic residue of winemaking. Then, your skin aglow with antioxidants, you’ll be overcome by the gentle tingle of vintage Champagne, warmed to body temperature, rinsing and cleansing your pores. As you drift into blissful sleep, you will be wrapped in the finest, apple-smoked bacon and topped with three kinds of cheese…

“And then, suitably marinated, you will be placed in a tanning bed to broil.”

What better way to follow irreverence than with irreverence. Hardy Wallace, who masqueraded for a time as the Murphy-Goode social media menace, is as irreverent as the come. The problem is that people keep taking him seriously. Of course, it’s understandable. He takes serious topics and treats them with less respect than traditional wisdom thinks they deserve. That is what happens when someone speaks out and calls a spade a spade. Those folks who would rather see the land tilled with a spoon than a roto-tiller will complain that he is playing too rough. Maybe he is. I would suggest you go and see for yourself.

The blog is called “Dirty South Wine” and is found at http://www.dirtysouthwine.com/. Be sure to read the essay, “It’s Time To Put The Snobbery Back Into Wine”. A fair number of people misinterpreted it into meaning that the more abstruse and arcane we make wine information, that better it is to keep wine on a special plane all its own-—and the higher the better. I read Mr. Wallace as saying that too much has been made of the complaint that only insiders can understand words about wine. I look at my neighbors—-ordinary middle class folks, educated, professional but not a wine geek among them, yet they all know the relative differences between the varieties, often between AVAs and have a pretty good sense of what makes special wine special. While there, read the comments that accompany the essay. Bo Simon who runs the Sonoma County Wine Library puts it all in perspective with the following, “Don't worry about wine losing its mystery. Like the innocence of the vestal virgins, wine's mystery is renewable”.

Monday Manifestos
Get Ready for Big Red—It’s A Party

Mon, 14 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

When California turned the corner into the 1970s and began to increase its focus on wines that would age well, more than a few wineries discovered tannin. And based on the conclusion that tannin was the missing ingredient, several worthies like Ridge and Freemark Abbey in the beginning and others like Burgess, Fetzer (yes, Fetzer was once a small, fledgling label) and Carneros Creek discovered that Petite Sirah produced more tannin per mouthful than any other grape in their arsenal. By the middle of the 1970s, we were awash in wines that, to be fair, only a woodchuck with a steel wool toothbrush could like.

Of course, back in the day, we all liked them. I still have bunch in my cellar that developing wisdom later told me not to open lest my palate would need a couple of days off. It was not long before Connoisseurs’ Guide decided to stop reviewing Petite Sirah because it was for the most part, an exercise in brawn and bluster and had very little to do with balance, with fruit, with usefulness with food. That was when we discovered the cult aspect of Petite Sirah. Contrary to our view of the wines of the era, there were folks who simply adored the grape and wrote us nasty letters explaining how they had wonderful recipes for moose and sausages and peppery stews that could not be enjoyed with those sissy wines like Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel and Napa Gamay. Only Petite Sirah would do.

We would try Petite Sirah from time to time, but we rarely found more than a few wines to like, and, as the result, we finally stopped reviewing it altogether. But time and the learning curve do wonderful things for wine, and the Petite Sirah makers began to change the way the wine presented itself. The key, some of them discovered, was to make the muscle a little less over the top and to allow the inner fruit to express itself. Into this scenario of change and optimism came a then little known organization under the hopeful name, PS I Love You.

Its leaders were folks like Jim Concannon, David Bruce and Lou Foppiano, all producers who understood the grape better than the tannin lovers of the day, and under their guidance, Petite Sirah, a new and more accessible Petite Sirah began to be recognized. I am the first to admit that it took this new organization and its leaders to convince me to come back to Petite Sirah. It is still a brawny wine, but it is now a wine with insides as well as structure, and that difference has made Petite Sirah into a grape with a future.

Petite Sirah is like the Phoenix. It measured about 4,000 acres in 1961. By 1972, there were still about 4,000 acres in bearing acreage, but there was another 4,000 acres that had been planted in the previous couple of years. By 1976, acreage peaked at 14,000. And then the tables turned. From that point forward, Petite Sirah saw a steady downward spiral in popularity, and thus in acreage, until it hit its low in 1995 of 2,300 acres. With a change in style, and a new and growing audience, Petite Sirah started back and approached 4,000 acres by the Millennium and has neared 8,000 acres today.

And, with a reported 700-plus producers of the wine and its place now once again established, Petite Sirah has acquired a dedicated party all its own. It is called Dark and Delicious, and it happens at the Rockwall Winery in Alameda on Friday night (Feb 18) from 600 to 900. It is billed as a wine and food event, and it is that, but, more than most public tastings, this is a wine event in which serious aficionados turn out to try their favorite grape from the more than 40 wineries that will be pouring.

If Petite Sirah is you, and you are in the Bay Area, this is an event not to be missed.

Sunday Serendipity
My Favorite Vermouth—The Perfect Manhattan

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I never gave all that much thought to Vermouth. It was not something to talk about the way we do wine. There was white Vermouth and red Vermouth, dry and sweet respectively, and I kept a bottle of each around, usually opened for too long, for making the occasional Manhattan or Martini. Once in a while I might hear a quick, half-hearted defense of the French or Italian version being the best, but Vermouth was never something that remotely piqued interest. Then, I met Carpano Antica Formula.

Piedmontese distiller, Antonio Benedetto Carpano is generally credited with inventing Vermouth in the late Eighteenth Century. The story goes that he was particularly passionate about the poetry of Goethe and so named his new concoction of herb- and wormwood-infused fortified wine after the German word for the latter, “wermut”. Over the next fifty or so years companies like Cinzano, Martini & Rossi and Noilly Pratt began making Vermouth and are still the best known names. It is, however, Carpano to which I would pay tribute today.

Carpano Antica Formula is an intensely flavored red Vermouth said to be based on Signor Carpano’s original recipe, and it is a bonafide eye-opener, if like me, you have considered Vermouths to be pretty much all the same…if you considered them at all. Very full-bodied, moderately sweet and amazingly complex with a pronounced bitter edge, it can claim credit for making me a late-to-arrive devotee of the classic Manhattan Cocktail. Mix it in a one-to-three ratio with a high-quality Bourbon or Rye Whiskey, the “one” part being Vermouth, along with a few drops of artisanal bitters (the Fee Brothers Whiskey Barrel-Aged version if it can be found) for a revelatory reworking of the drink.

One final bit of advice on the topic of Vermouth; it would be well to remember that Vermouth is at its heart wine, and it will not last forever once opened. Refrigeration is a must once a new bottle is started, and even then you should not expect more than a few weeks of viable use. I have found that portioning newly opened Vermouth into several half-bottles and immediately corking them after a quick spray of Private Preserve will extend viability by a couple of months. This is particularly helpful in the case of Carpano Antica Formula as it is sold only larger one-liter bottles, and there is, after all, only so many perfect Manhattans one can drink.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
The Next Cabernet Heaven

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Steve Heimoff has an uncanny ability to make people think. In fact, I can go one step further and tell you that I like his blog because he makes me think. He sees ideas in his head and plays them out on his eponymous blog, Steve Heimoff. Yesterday, he asked the simplest of questions yet got no answers because there are none.

He asked of himself and his legions of faithful followers: Can other regions challenge Napa when it comes to Cabernet? He forthrightly answered the question with No and Yes, but, by the end of his essay, he had changed his mind and his answers were now Yes and No. To be fair to Mr. Heimoff, he did expand his question into two parts—could any region come along to challenge Napa Cab for supremacy OR is Napa Cab such a strong “brand” that no one could catch up.

By initially answering No and Yes, Heimoff was giving in to the conventional wisdom that says the Napa/Cabernet pairing is so good, so delicious that no region could get inside it for prominence, and even it could, it would still stand behind Napa in prestige. Whether his blog-borne conversion was the result of a second thought or a bit of writer’s artifice, a bit of drama to make the conclusion stand out we will never know. But it does not matter in any event.

The problem with the question is that it has no answer. Nobody knows. Somewhere in California may lurk another Sutter’s Mill or Napa Valley. We have not had a second gold rush and we have been waiting a century and half. We have not yet found a full-on challenger to Napa Valley Cabernet and winemakers have been looking for almost a century and a half.

But we do know this. Most of the large, plantable land masses in California are planted. Not all are in grapes, but almost every potential site of any size has been tried and that includes land from one end of California to the other and from the ocean to the Sierras.

At the ZAP tasting last week, Bob Marr of Marr Vineyards came by the Connoisseurs’ Guide table to say hello, and, oh incidentally, would I like to taste his Cabernet from Tehama County. He was particularly excited about it because it hails from an area where no one expects fine wine to hail from. And it led us into a fascinating conversation about all the possible undiscovered sites in California where the potential exists but has not been given a good test.

Perhaps they never will. Or perhaps we are waiting for a visionary like Randall Grahm to take up the “next great Cabernet site” search the way Mr. Grahm has wrestled with Rhône varieties and has now cast his lot with a barren but fertile hillside just south of Hollister in San Benito County.

For now, Mr. Heimoff’s answer to his own questions grades out as: Incomplete. If you ask me, that kind of question is always going to grade out as Incomplete because there is always the chance that somewhere in this world, we will discover a better place of Pinot Noir than Romanée-Conti, a better place for Sauternes than Sauternes, a better place for sparkling wine than Champagne. And even if we never do, someone somewhere is going to keep on trying and folks like thee and me are going to be there tasting the results just in case.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Red Wine and Chocolate—-Irreconcilable Differences

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Dry red wine and chocolate; it is a marriage that rarely succeeds, and it can be downright ugly at times. It has always struck me as more than a little ironic that the union of the two is annually touted as an appropriate way to celebrate February’s soon-to-arrive holiday of affection. “Irreconcilable differences” is the phrase that immediately leaps to mind, and over the years I have encountered enough bizarre recipes and recommendations that I wonder whether poor old Saint Valentine might have actually chosen martyrdom if faced with one more red wine and chocolate pairing.

Now, there are people and palates that I very much respect who apparently enjoy red wine and chocolate, and I have come over time to suspect that just maybe it is something genetic, that there is a certain kink in the DNA spiral that says some will be inspired and enthralled by the combination and others will loathe it. There seems to be no middle ground, no lukewarm endorsements and no half-hearted dismissals, and, while I generally find little joy in the match, a couple of simple guidelines will go a long way to at least avoiding disaster.

The problem, I think, is less the chocolate itself but lies instead with the sweetness that inevitably accompanies it. There has been an occasional savory dish that incorporates chocolate that I have found to be very palatable with a dry red, but when sweetness appears on the plate, the wine with which it is served should be a bit sweeter. If not, it is striking just how sour the wine will seem to be. The astringent, mouth-drying pucker of tannic red wines is amplified by sweeter foods to the point that those tannins dominate everything else, and I have yet to make my way through a Cabernet-accompanied, chocolaty dessert course with anything approaching satisfaction. There is a host of sweeter red wines, ranging from fortified Ports to sundry late-harvest efforts that are charged with residual sugar that will do the trick, but most dry ones are just trouble waiting to happen. Those adventurous souls who are still undeterred would do best to opt for lower-tannin bottlings such as Merlot and Zinfandel, and, in fact, very ripe examples of the latter are often marked by a certain chocolaty streak themselves.

I plan on pouring a fine old Cabernet Sauvignon for dinner with the one that I love this Valentine’s evening, but it will not be with chocolate and it will not be for dessert. It will be poured alongside the likes of a medium-rare chateaubriand, a thick cut of prime rib or perhaps a slowly braised short rib...just right where it belongs.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
A Collective Sigh of Relief—And Then Reality Set In

Tue, 08 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

On Saturday, Robert Parker stepped down. By Sunday, the collective sigh of relief was heard throughout the California wine industry. A half a dozen blogs, and those are the ones I know about, commented breathlessly. And then the worrying began. What will happen to California wine when Mr. Parker’s palate no longer dominates the landscape? Will the shift in wine styles that we talked about in this space yesterday be accelerated? Who is this new voice that Mr. Parker has anointed?

To get the answers to these and other questions, I went back to those several blogs and their near choral harmony of comments, and, in case you have not read them yet yourselves, they are featured below as the best of the blogs.

Jon Bonné, the San Francisco Chronicle wine editor, deserves mention for taking a moderate and thoughtful stance that sees first that the tea leaves have not settled and whose comments “What this means for California is a mixed deal — but ultimately I think it will mean very good things. Those awaiting the demise of big, hedonistic cult wines are probably out of luck. (Did you think Robert Parker would choose as his replacement someone who’d suddenly toss Bryant Family on the heap?)” rings so true for me that, in my mind, it trumps every other comment that I have read.

Still, consider the following—some of which are quite funny while others are outrageous and most are simply rank speculation.

In The Gray Market Report, Blake Gray had me in stitches with “My first thought on learning that Robert Parker will no longer review California wines was, what's Enologix going to do?”. For those who do not know, and why would anybody outside the industry know, Enologix is a consulting firm that claims to know the secrets to getting big scores based on wine color and other measure of saturation and extraction. If the new California reviewer for the Wine Advocate has a different palate than his master, Mr. Parker, does Enologix now have to change its model? Or are they simply out of business?

And consider this knee-slapper posted in the comments section of the Gray blog. A poster using the name Portland Charcuterie Project offers this conjecture, “No more 90+ point California Pinot Noirs... that's for sure.” Gee, I wonder what this guy has been tasting—or smoking. Obviously not the new Williams Selyem Pinots, that’s for sure. And maybe he is unaware that Jancis Robinson, the only winewriter in the world whose words carry a force nearly that of Mr. Parker, commented that the Russian River Pinots are the second best in the world after Burgundy. Sorry, Mr. PCP, but I rather think your comment is full of baloney, and not very good baloney at that.

Alder Yarrow, whose blog Vinography, throws very few brickbats, although his rants can be fun—just not frequent enough, thoughtfully commented, “Many will dismiss this event as non-news, and might suggest (with some degree of truth) that Parker has been fading in influence for some time. Watching the unraveling of the ParkTator critical hegemony in this country has been fascinating sport, and it's clear we're in the midst of very interesting times when it comes to American wine criticism.” OK, we are all getting older, and I have said several times in different forums (fora?) that folks like Parker, Laube, Olken, Heimoff are going to fade from the scene. We are all in our sixties, and while we have outlived Elvis, we cannot go on forever. But, frankly, I will be surprised if the important wine review vehicles lose their places any time soon. There is nothing to take their places at this point, and it may well turn out that the bylines on the reviews change but that the names of the vehicles do not.

I am a fan of William Allen’s blog, Simple Hedonisms, but it is hard to avoid the notion that he has allowed himself to get a bit too carried away with the following, “It is the dawn of a new wine era. I can hear the likes of Alice Feiring and Randall Grahm (and many more) breathing a sigh with a hope that the era of big, tannic, extracted, dark color wines will transform into a Renaissance of Old World style.” In the first place, the shift to a new paradigm is well under way. Read yesterday’s blog for an extended discussion of that notion. In the second, Parker not only liked big, bold wines, but he recently gave 97 points to a Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet that registered 13.2% alcohol. And finally, while I do not know Alice Feiring, but do think she has her own narrow view of wines and that her view will never be a dominant view, I do know Randall Grahm. Randall Grahm is a friend of mine. And Randall Grahm spends no time worrying about Robert Parker. Quite simply, he does not dance to other people’s drums.

This topic, the semi-retirement of Robert Parker will be with us for some time as we do what Jon Bonné has so perspicaciously suggested—watch the tea leaves settle.

Monday Manifestos
The New California Wine Paradigm Unmasked

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Meet the new paradigm for California wine--just like the old paradigm.

Paul Hoffman, owner/operator of Headbanger wines told me, “I want to make Zinfandel the way it was made thirty years ago”. Eric Asimov, the New York Times winewriter tweeted, “Arnot-Roberts is California wine rethought”. Jared Brandt of Donkey and Goat winery in Oakland, whose efforts to make moderated-alcohol wine with bright acidity has led him to be identified as part of the “new wave” told me that there is no new wave, only a greater emphasis on a style of California wine that has always existed.

From each of these learned gentleman comes both the recognition that the push for extended ripeness in California wine that took hold in the latter nineties and has held sway until the last couple of vintages is beginning to play itself out, and also, if one looks carefully at their words, a further recognition that a lighter yet still concentrated style with brighter acid balance has fast become the order of the day.

It can be called a paradigm shift, of course. It was just a little over a decade when the leader of a seminar on Rutherford-grown Cabernet Sauvignons told the assembled audience of winewriters, “You can forget about those old, tight, tannic Cabs. The public wants wines to drink now, and they are getting them in the fatter, juicier style that is fast taking over the marketplace”. I happened, at that time, to be sitting next to Gerald Asher, who is perhaps the wisest of the American-based writers, probably because he has seen it all. He simply rolled his eyes at what sounded like heresy to folks like us who had cut our vinous eyeteeth on wines that would grow over time into depth and complexity that was nowhere to be seen in our youth.

Today, that winemaker would be laughed out of the room, but back then most people accepted that he was reflecting the new paradigm of his day and did not give it a second thought. Well, it turns out that excess ripeness does not play all that well because wine lovers everywhere, regardless of their love of voluptuous wines, also do want wines with balance. And more than that, all of us have an aversion to wines that have raisiny character.

So, out with the old and in with the new—except for this. The wines of Corison and Cuvaison and Marimar and Ridge, and yes, Donkey and Goat and Arnot-Roberts, have never gone over to the heavy side of the spectrum. And for every name that I have written down, there are dozens more who always produced wines in what is all of a sudden being called “the new paradigm”.

Take the Sauvignon Blancs reviewed in our February issue. There is no question that they have higher acidity levels and lower pHs on average than they would have exhibited five or eight years ago. But, wineries like Grgich Hills, Gary Farrell, Benziger have always favored the brisk, tight end of the Sauvignon Blanc spectrum. Don’t tell them that there is a new paradigm. They have continued to make wines in their chosen styles.

The same can be said for almost every variety. Nalle with Dry Creek Zinfandel. Acacia with Carneros Chardonnay. Edmunds-St. John for Zins and Rhône reds. We are really not inventing a new paradigm here in California. We are finding our ways back to the old paradigm in a process that we have seen play out several times in the most recent decades.

But this time something is different. The swing in preferred style will not do away with other styles. It cannot as long as those styles are also based on balance. Rockpile-area Zinfandels and Syrahs are never going to be light wines. The Sierra foothills do not need to be a place of overt overripeness but the best wines from those slopes are almost always going to be full in body.

And that folks, is the way it should be. The real new paradigm in California wine is not simply lighter and brighter. It is more a case of letting the grapes tell the winemaker what is the best possible style rather than the winemakers (or the markets) telling the grapes what to do. The day is not going to come when all great Chardonnays are going to be made with 13.5% alcohol and 0.70 and higher total acidities. Balance is not just the presence of bristling acidity. In California, it will always include the capture of the fruity potential offered by our vineyards. The real new paradigm is not one style but the acceptance of many styles that produce the best wines. Meet the new paradigm—just like the old paradigm.

Sunday Serendipity
The Gin Is The Thing

Sun, 06 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

You will not find chocolate in a true Martini. A Martini is not made with Sake, it is never pink and it is not served in a glass whose rim has been sugared. As a critic and teacher, I do try to keep an open and somewhat catholic mind when it comes to food and drink, but there are some inviolate truths in my world, and one of them is that a Martini is about Gin, a short splash of dry Vermouth (preferably Dolin’s) and a twist…with the olive optional for those who believe they must.

Vodka, you say? I say not. It is the botanical complexity of Gin that is the very soul of the drink. The inherently faceless and anonymous nature of Vodka makes a drink composed of little more than a fast track to inebriation. Devotees may argue about shaking or stirring. I, as a rule, choose the former as I prefer the slight dilution and extra cold that comes as the corners of the ice cubes are rounded by vigorous shaking, but either technique is just fine so long as one remembers that Gin is the thing. A properly made Gin Martini refreshes and fortifies and stimulates and soothes all at the same time, and there is something about it that civilizes when the events of the day do otherwise.

Needless to say, the pleasure of a drink so simple is profoundly revealing of the particular Gin used, and all Martini true-believers will be more than happy to tell you just which one is best. I confess to liking more than a few and will often choose one over another depending on whim and mood, but not long ago I came across a new label that instantly moved to the very head of the class.

Bluecoat American Dry Gin made in Philadelphia is nothing short of a revelation. Gin is typically the product of continuous column stills on what we might call an industrial scale, but Bluecoat is a small-batch craft spirit distilled in a hand-hammered copper pot still with a proprietary blend of organic botanicals including juniper berries and American citrus peels. It is a wonderfully complex spirit of real depth and polish, and its subtle but insistent juniper themes are perfectly balanced by its bright streak of citrus and back-notes of bitter orange. It is at once both immensely flavorful but never pungent, and, while checking in at a full 94 proof, it never tastes hot and exhibits an uncanny sense of balance and refinement.

Small-scale craft-distilling in the United States has seen significant success of late, and as we have devoted past columns to the remarkable spirits of producers such as St. George Spirits, Osacalis and High West distillery, so will we continue to report on indigenous beauties as we find them. Bluecoat Gin fills a hitherto unfilled niche, and it comes with highest recommendation.

bluecoatgin.com

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Medals? You Want Them? We Found Them!

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

For a long time, a very long time, in fact, I have regarded wine competitions and the seemingly limitless numbers of medals they award with a like-minded measure of practiced skepticism. Actually, if truth be told, I have not really “regarded” them at all other than when inevitably asked about them by my students at the California Culinary Academy. Thus when I read Alder Yarrow’s report on a recent Vino 2011 panel discussion on the relevancy of competitions and medals introduced by the question of “Where have all the medals gone?,” I was frankly unaware that they had gone anywhere.

To me, the business of medals has been just that, business. A broad-based, mass-market means by which the wine industry could sell wine. Win a medal and the next day, wholesalers would be dropping colorful cardboard neck-rings on every inexpensive Merlot and Chardonnay stacked at the end of the aisle in large chain grocery stores. Fine. Advertising and marketing are in the lifeblood of a free-market economy. But, as markers of real quality, well, I have never been able to see any relationship between quality and medals, and I advise my students to simply ignore them. They are not bad, they are not good, they are best considered as useless, if sometimes attractive, decoration.

Now, I may not go as far as Alder as he concludes by his own experience that there is a direct and inverse relationship between quality and the number of medals that a wine has won, but I am far closer to his thinking than to that of those who defend the worth of wine competitions. And, I tend to agree that these competitions and medals “as a whole do a disservice to consumers by failing to be reliable guides to quality”.

The Vino 2011 panelists included a number of industry stalwarts and several seemed fairly defensive when facing the usual criticisms of large-scale competitions: grade inflation, too many wines, palate fatigue, qualifications of the judges, inconsistent methodology, etc. Accordingly, the usual rebuttals followed, but some, such as Dan Berger’s proud claim that at the Riverside County Fair judging over which he presides limits their tasters to only 120 wines per day rang a bit hollow to me. 120 wines a day? I’m sorry, that works out to three minutes per wine over six non-stop hours of tasting, and, I for one question just how much room that kind of schedule leaves for real comprehension. At Connoisseurs’ Guide, I taste and write for a living, have been for over thirty years, and trust me, palate fatigue is quite real.

Our typical tasting day will consist of no more than twenty wines, and we will allocate three to four hours for the task. Now, I am not claiming that our methodology is best, but it is rigorous and it is what works for us. True, the aim at CGCW is to describe the wine more than to simply find some hierarchical ranking and assign a score, the latter of which we at times view as a necessary evil of the business we are in. Medals come without commentary and simply say that this or that panel of “experts” liked one wine more than another. Nothing wrong with that if it is treated for what it is—a limited commentary with no context.

I do not expect the culture of large wine competitions to disappear any time soon, nor do I feel that they in any way threaten the future of fine wine in California. But neither do I see them furthering consumer education, and applaud Mr. Yarrow for questioning the emperor’s clothes. His report earns a solid “A” for its candor. Check out his thoughtful comments at http://www.vinography.com/.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Wine and Crab Pairings—New Insights From Santa Cruz

Wed, 02 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Over the last several years, my significant other has served as a judge at the annual Wine & Crab Taste Off hosted by the Santa Cruz Mountains Winegrowers Association. I have been more than happy to tag along, sample the year’s offerings and offer my own whispered opinions when it came time for her to make her votes…whether I was asked to or not. This year’s event, the eighth since its inception, featured a wide variety of crab recipes created by four leading restaurants in the greater Santa Cruz area.

While fresh crab and the wines best suited to accompany it was our Wednesday Wine and Food topic back in November, the Santa Cruz competition has afforded a somewhat different insight into the ways of crab and wine insofar as the plates were a more complicated and complex than simple cracked crab. Each of the four restaurants created two dishes with several Santa Cruz Mountain wineries on hand at each venue to pour a selection of more or less local bottlings. Now, the wines offered at each stop at times seemed selected with little thought as to how they really might work with crab (i.e., a few too many big-bodied Pinot Noirs, a couple of Syrahs and even a Central Valley Pinotage,) and I kept wishing for but never found a bottle of Riesling, but there proved to be more than a few tasty matches all the same.

One of my favorites, Crab and Scallop Quenelles with Crab and Lobster Veloute prepared by the Paradise Beach Grille in Capitola, was a superb dish in and of itself but was better yet when matched up with a refreshingly crisp and fruity, unoaked 2009 Chardonnay made by Savannah-Chanelle from grapes grown in Tondre’s Grapefield in the Santa Lucia Highlands. The intense, deeply flavored, chunky Crab Bisque Infused with Basil Oil from Café Cruz Rosticceria had enough richness to actually work with a lighter Pinot Noir but found a particularly good fit with Testarossa’s slightly caramelly, oak-sweetened 2008 Castello Chardonnay.

Restaurant Ma Maison’s milder Crab Bisque with Tarragon and Cognac Aroma needed Chardonnay of a somewhat lighter cut. Both the racy Quinta Cruz Verdelho made by Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyard and the pert, wonderfully lively 2009 Viognier from Nicholson were spot-on successes with the delicate Crab Cioppino with Brioche Topping and the Crab and Avocado Salad on Bruschetta served up by Sanderling’s at the Seascape Beach Resort.

We have always enjoyed the Santa Cruz Crab & Wine Taste Off, but from the standpoint of creativity, presentation and overall achievement, both of us thought this eighth incarnation the best yet. Moreover, we found a few unexpected food and wine marriages that caught us just a bit by surprise; and that, after all, is the real measure of a wonderfully worthwhile afternoon. We are already looking forward to the ninth annual outing next year, and, if your interest has been at all piqued, the event is open to all food and wine lovers. You can find out more at the Santa Cruz Mountains Winegrowers Association website below.

http://www.scmwa.com/

Monday Manifestos
Zinfandel Secrets Revealed

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I spent all of Saturday at the ZAP (Zinfandel Advocates and Producers) Grand Tasting in San Francisco. In conversations with as many of the three hundred winemakers in attendance as I could track down, I was told several times, and in no uncertain terms, the “secrets” of Zinfandel. And I would like to share them with you.

Now, you will have to bear with me a bit here, because, as is often the case in discussions about important wine topics, the “secrets” often contradict each other. But, hey, that is what makes it interesting. Besides, look at the fun we can have dissecting these secrets—some of which turn out to be self-evident on their faces regardless of the earnestness with which they were offered.

Item No. 1: “I am going to get back to making Zinfandel the way it was made in the 1970s”.

If the idea is to make lighter, more pertly balanced Zinfandel, then bring it on. But, as I remember the ‘70s, it was also the period of the first “late harvest” Zin boom with wineries like David Bruce, Mayacamas and others making wines up into the 17% range, often with residual sugar and tannin levels that would suck the moisture out of your tongue. So, I am going to assume that this secret has to do with trying to make Zin with taste and balance at alcohols levels under 14%. I’m all over that idea, but, folks, there is nothing magic about the 14% threshold. Balance, depth, focus, complexity remain the keys to success in any wine and for any grape.

Item No.2: “In this age of global warming and all kinds of trellising systems, Zinfandel wants to be made ripe or it will taste green”.

There is a great deal of truth to this sentiment until one looks behind it. Yes, most grapes are now grown in trellising systems for all kinds of reasons including increased yields, better ability to control leaf counts and shading, ease of picking. And, yes, many winemakers discovered that higher sugars also meant deeper wines. When the consumers started responding positively, the race was on and it is only in the last few years that the notion of lighter balance that is so much a part of the item above has come back into sway. For those of us who have been observing CA wines for several decades now, this swing in sentiment is not new. It is, however, going to be harder to achieve because of climate change and trellising systems that emphasize earlier and higher ripeness levels along with increased yields.

Item No. 3: “I’m working with a Zinfandel vineyard in the Carneros district in order to get less ripe grapes”.

If you asked most vineyardists to name the places where they would not put Zinfandel, the very cool Carneros District would certainly be on most lists. It is hard enough to ripen Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in many locations there, but the fact is that there are sheltered nooks and crannies that also make good Merlot and cool-climate Syrah so why not Zinfandel. I asked the winery owner/winemaker how he thought he was going to get away with it and he forthrightly answered that he would have to restrict yield and be at least somewhat generous with sun exposure. Zin sunburns easily, so the winery is walking a tightrope here, but gambit may produce some elegant and balanced Zinfandel if the idea plays out.

Item No. 4: “Too many people are trying to make Zinfandel into something it isn’t”.

Here we have the argument for overcropped,, trellis-trained, generic red wine to be sold under the Zin name at prices that are intended to cover for the lack of character. And, believe it or not, I have sympathy for this argument. Most Zinfandel in California is not grown in moderate warmth places that are conducive to making fine wine. And the world does drink a heck of a lot more of inexpensive plonk than it does pricey wine. It is the rare Cabernet of decent quality that comes with a price tag much below $20-25. Not so Zin. And especially not so Zin if the grapes have not been left to turn into raisins before they are picked. Zinfandel was often the “heart and soul” of good jug wine in days gone by. There is no reason why long-cropped and carefully grown Zin cannot have that role in today’s everyday table wines.

But, that is where my sympathy ends. I do not want to see us walk Zinfandel backwards to the 1960s in the name of “progress”. Let vineyards do what they can, and if they can make great wines, let them do it.

Item No. 5: “The South Will Rise Again”.

Said in jest by a winemaker who is having a hard time selling Zin but believes that his wines will recover along with the rest of the wine market. Yes, Zin has hit hard times for some makers but not for all. It is not Syrah, after all, which even the top producers are having a hard time selling. But, the key, as always is quality for the asking price. And, with Zinfandel suddenly having rushed up to $40, and sometimes more, for wines that were frequently keyed more on ripeness and oak than on fruit, balance and varietal precision, my vantage point on the world seems to suggest that “very big” will be too big for those makers whose wines do not also have the essential elements at their centers. Big Zinfandel is not going to disappear despite the distaste that some parts of the wine world have for it because there is a segment of the consuming public that likes it. Yet, just as in the late ‘70s when the public’s taste began to shift from bigness to “goodness”, so too is that shift clearly underway today, and, if the “South is going to rise again” for makers of outsized Zins, some of those makers are going to need to look for wines that taste like Zinfandel, not like raisins and oak.

Satisfying Saturdays
ZAP Wine and Food Pairings

Sat, 29 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Spent Thursday night at the ZAP Wine and Food Pairings event. I like this event very much because it is smaller than the Saturday Grand Tasting and thus affords more opportunity to interact with old friends and subscribers who stream by our table. And then there is the food. Over 50 wineries present their wines, and every one of those wines is paired (hopefully) with complimentary foods provided by some very fine restaurants and well-regarded food purveyors.

We did not get to taste all fifty combinations. If anyone did, they have more persistence and stronger stomachs than we did. But there were several foods that we will remember and seek out again, and some we will go out of our way to avoid. Here are brief comments on those that impressed us one way or the other, including the name of the restaurant.

Flavor, SantaRosa: Sweet potato soufflé-Timbale with a trio of cheeses. Not sure how much we would call this Zinfandel food, but this sweet potato mash of sorts would make a fine partner to the smoked pork chops we like with Zinfandel. So, this one is a winner.

Rose’s Café, San Francisco: Crispy pork belly, caramelized onions on crostini. Frankly, the sound of this dish had us running up the hall to seek it out. And it turned out to be less than advertised. The pork belly was good, but it got lost. Still, we like a well-turned out pork belly so we dumped the bread and ate the square nugget of protein. A moderate success. Not sure we would pair pork belly with Zin however.

Town Hall, San Francisco: Chicken and Andouille Gumbo. Not surprisingly, one of our favorite “comfort food” restaurants came up with a tasty, perfectly seasoned gumbo. Whether it would be a Zin dish is open to question, but a lighter Zin might do it. As for the gumbo, we want more.

Brutocao’s Bocce Grill, Hopland: BBQ Spareribs, Zin Sauce. If you travel up towards Mendocino, your first stop will be in Hopland just over the border from Sonoma County. The last time up there, we stayed in Hopland and wandered over to Brutocao to watch the Bocce on their manicured courts. This sparerib was well-cooked has a nice splash of sauce and did work extremely well Zinfandel.

Calcareous Vineyard, Paso Robles: Spicy Beef and Blue Cheese Tacos: Tasty bits to be sure, but more likely to go with Syrah or a Rhone Blend than with Zin.

Central Market, Petaluma, Liberty Farm Spiced Duck Chili: In this case, the spices were not hot but were instead flavor deliverers like coriander, cilantro and something a little sweet, savory possibly cinnamon. We are not fans of hot (picante) dishes with Zin. Heat with heat does not work for us. This dish, because it avoids heat in exchange for flavor, worked well with the Ravenswood Zins with which it was paired.

Compadres Rio Grill, Napa: Tacos Al Pastor: We have had our fill of Tacos Al Pastor—mostly composed of dried bits of grilled pork absent flavors spilling out of small corn tortillas. So we passed. But then, first Blake Gray and then Lynne Bennett came by to ask if we had tasted the dish. We admitted that we had not and corrected that oversight. And they were right. This Al Pastor was the usual bits of pork, but they were presented in a savory sauce that extended their flavor. It was our favorite dish of the night and would be good Zinfandel food.

A Chef For You, Philadelphia: Chocolate Spring Mix. It’s hard not to ask what a Philadelphia firm is doing at a California event, but this awful sounding dish was even worse in presentation. Putting chocolate into salad dressing not only looked terrible but tasted worse. It was not long before it was totally ignored, and then those dressed greens wilted.

One Market Restaurant, San Francisco: Zinfandel Risotto with Duck Confit and Applewood Smoked Bacon. Loved the sound of the dish. Big fan of this San Francisco dinner house, but what we found was a gluey mix that was grey and uninviting in appearance.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
The Berger Discussion: Who’s Laughing Now

Thu, 27 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

One does not make fun of Dan Berger, even with kindness, without making a lot of his fans upset. We all know that Dan takes himself seriously, but these folks take him even more seriously than he takes himself. Frankly, I am jealous.

I wrote an editorial the other day about intolerance in wine discussions. I had to mention my brothers just to guarantee myself an audience. Contrast that with what happened when I wrote about Dan’s odd claim that “the blanding of American wine is nearly complete”. His followers came out of the woodwork in numbers that drove my brothers back into hiding.

My New York brother, the one who never met a debate that he did not like, wrote to me this comforting advice, “Charlie, I thought I told you not to piss off the pope. You got yourself into this, and I can’t help no matter how many times you mention me in print”. OK, Jonboy, I get it.

The funny, odd thing is that my initial comments had nothing to do with Dan’s body of work over his lifetime. But in questioning the hyperbolic reaction that led from a Tweet by a know-nothing into the near-denigration of all wine made in America, I apparently invited defense of everything Dan has ever written. Before turning to some of those comments, I need to add this one other note. I actually sometimes, on occasion, especially when I am in a good mode, agree with Dan. The rest of the time I find him somewhat over the top and narrowly prescriptive for my taste.

But it is just that attitude that has earned Dan his legion of followers. He tells it like he sees it, and he has the ability to convince others that he is right. That is why the world needs more of “My Running Argument With Dan Berger”—because someone has to set the record straight.

I do owe some of Dan’s people thanks for pitching in. I think I understand more now. Consider these comments.

“Dan Berger is one of the remaining wine reviewers who offers consistant (sic) praise to winemaker's striving for wines made in yesteryear”

“I think Dan has a point that you've forgotten to talk about. His big issue isn't so much with high alcohol wines, but the high pH that's goes hand-in-hand with those wines.”

My comment: This was the first of many columns under the rubric, “My Running Argument With Dan Berger”. No need to examine each of his positions at once. Besides, while high pH is certainly not going to produce longevity in wine, who ever said that every wine needed to age twenty years. And besides, acidity can at least bring some high pH wines into balance.

“. . . blandness corresponds to high alcohol, and approaching 4 x 4 on the acid and Ph.”

My comment: Have you tasted the wines of JC Cellars, Dehlinger, Shafer, Staglin, Ridge, Rubicon? By the way, one of the notions upon which Dan and I agree is that balance is the key to success, and there is nothing about high alcohol that, by itself, makes wine bland, dull, soft, out of balance.

“Let the old man rant, it's all just opinion.”

My comment: Careful, buddy. I’m older than Dan--chronologically.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Ibérico Fresco: Another Reason to Like Grenache

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

“Pigs and Pinot” was the featured topic a few weeks back, and the spotlight shines once again on pork, but pork quite unlike any that I have experienced before. The same pork that when cured is justly revered as one of the greatest culinary treats in the world, Jamon Ibérico de Bellota, has hitherto been unavailable in the United States in its fresh form, but as of February should be found in select stores under the name of Ibérico Fresco.

The purebred Ibérico pig is raised in free-range conditions in the pesticide- and herbicide-free meadows and oak forests of Southwestern Spain and is fattened in the autumn months on a diet of freshly fallen acorns that are said to impart a unique nutty flavor to its meat. Much prized for its marbling, its high levels of healthy omega-3 fatty acids and oleic acid, and its extraordinarily rich flavor, Ibérico Fresco has been called the Kobe Beef of pork.

I was recently invited to a professional seminar at Sausalito’s Cavallo Point Cooking School that celebrated the imminent American arrival of Ibércio Fresco. Chef Dani Martin of Barcelona prepared a wide range of recipes that highlighted this altogether remarkable product. The day’s menu included “Tataki of Ibérico two ways with Wild Mushrooms and Truffle Veil”, “Carpaccio of Ibérico Fresco with Foie Gras”, “Roasted Ibérico Fresco Sirloin Tip”, and “Roasted Loin of Ibérico with Cocoa Beans, Red Berries and Bread Crumbs”, among a good many other remarkable dishes. Each plate was nothing less than a real revelation.

This was simply the richest and most succulent pork I have ever encountered. It was, in truth, something other than anything I would recognize as pork. Now I grew up in an era when pork was always cooked to the point of resembling old leather, but Chef Dani recommended that Ibérico Fresco be cooked to no more than medium-rare. I confess to deep trepidation then abject delight as I finished my Carpaccio of raw pork! Halfway to the savory strength of the finest beef, but of an entirely different character, Ibérico Fresco fills a unique gastronomic niche all its own, and I enthusiastically now count myself among the newly enlightened.

So, what is the right wine to serve as its foil? Pinot Noir can work, but it will need to be one of the more substantial versions, and those made by DuMol, Kosta Browne, Dehlinger and Merry Edwards would be nothing short of ideal. A bottle or two of Rioja Crianza made its way around the room, and there is no question that Ibérico Fresco has the richness to measure up to fine Tempranillo. I secretly wished for an old-vine Garnacha or a well-ripened California Grenache such as the stunning Grey Stack 2007 from Bennett Valley, and it will be just such a bottle that will be in one hand as I head to the kitchen sometime next month with a fresh cabecero (sirloin tip) of Ibérico Fresco in the other.

http://ibericofresco.com/

Tuesday Tributes
2008 Bordeaux: The First Report

Tue, 25 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot, with additional comments by Shaun Bishop

Without question, one of the more significant tasting events on any year’s calendar is the annual Union des Grands Crus de Bordeaux presentation of soon-to-be-released bottlings from the region’s top estates. We make a point of attending the West Coast showing whether in Los Angeles or, as this year, in San Francisco, and spent a good bit of the day last Friday sipping and spitting our way through many dozens of wines of the 2008 vintage. We will offer up extensive tasting notes in our March issue, but our initial impression is that the vintage is a very good if not a great one, and there are assuredly a few trends worth noting.

By way of introduction, we asked our friends at JJ Buckley, the online wine specialist to comment on the state of the Bordeaux wine market especially in light of the changing world markets and the economic upheavals of the past few years. Thanks to Shaun Bishop for sharing his comments with us.

From a consumer perspective, '08 Bordeaux presents an interesting value proposition for a few reasons. First, the vintage produced wines with good freshness, ripe fruit, and sweet tannins – all characteristics that make for great near to mid-term drinking. Second, the vintage was initially sold into the marketplace ‘en primeur’ at a time when the economy was weak and unstable, forcing the Chateaux to release at lower prices than they would have liked. Last, the wines were purchased by US wholesalers and retailers with a dollar that was 10% stronger than it is today. Most of this low pricing is still available to the consumer, and after an expensive 2009 ‘en primeur’ campaign, savvy consumers will certainly take the opportunity to stock up on the vintage while they wait for their '09s (and 05’s) to mature in the cellar.

The sweet spot in 2008 appears to be the $25-75 category. Below $25, the quality is a bit uneven and consumers would be better off waiting for the 2009s with their across the board quality. Above $75, the premium spent goes to the label as much as it does to the quality (with Pomerol representing an exception). The First Growths were a good value when first released, but at this time have lost much, if not all, of the remaining near-term upside price potential. There were certainly some excellent releases from St Emilion in '08, but overall, it was a bit spotty in quality and one needs to select with caution as some wines were over-extracted with harsh tannins. On the Left Bank, most of the activity we have seen is from the 2nd through 4th Growths where in many cases, these are priced 50% less than their 2009 counterparts. I invite you to visit us at www.jjbuckley.com/ to learn more about our view of the 2008s as they begin to come in over the next several months.

The vintage was in some ways reminiscent of 2010 in California insofar as it was a long, late and slow one. Happily, for the Bordelaise at least, the harvest came with neither errant heat spikes in summer nor did it end with the damaging rains that proved such a bane hereabouts. Many of the winemakers we spoke with viewed the 2008 vintage as something of a miracle, for while it was a year which began with April frosts followed by a very damp May and one in which “the vines never did anything fast,” the day was saved, so to speak, by a sunny, wonderfully warm autumn. Others, such as Olivier Bernard of Domaine de Chevalier made the case that, while the harvest turned out quite well, winemakers and vignerons might also deserve a bit of the credit. He opined that it was the kind of vintage whose wines would not have fared nearly so well with viticulture and viniculture as practiced some twenty-five years ago. Of particular note, he pointed out that the grapes for contemporary Bordeaux are given longer hang time, and that while a vintage like 2008 would have once resulted in average alcohols of 11.0%, the norm now instead is nearer 13.5%.

If the meteorological numbers in 2008 look remarkably similar to those of 2007, the wines are generally darker and deeper, with good ripeness and ample weight. They are not as rich and ripe as those of 2005, but they are clearly not the weaklings that some have predicted.

On balance, the 2008 dry whites from Graves and Pessac Leognan are marked successes. At the least, they are bright and buoyant and charged with lots of fine fruity acids, while the best of the bunch, such as the deep and impressively layered Domaine de Chevalier are compelling, very well-structured wines of great poise and richness.

Not surprisingly, the reds seem a bit of a mixed bag, with many of our favorites coming from the Left Bank. Domaine de Chevalier’s slightly briary, very solid red offering was among our picks from Pessac-Leognan, and the estates of St. Julien and Margaux showed particularly well with high marks going to Chateau Beychevelle and Chateau Brane Cantenac. The sturdy Chateau Lynch-Bages and comparatively mannerly Chateau Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande led the way on our scorecards for Pauillac, and, while we found the featured wines of the much ballyhooed Merlot-dominated districts east of the river to be a bit spotty, Chateau L’Angelus is a winner, and the Chateau La Gaffeliere may well be the best we have tasted from this property in years.

The sweet wines of Sauternes and Barsac were, perhaps, the most curious and difficult to gauge of the bunch. Both appellations were subject to disastrous frosts in April, and yields were down dramatically. In some cases, 70% of the crop had been lost before summer had arrived, and Didier Frechinet of Chateau La Tour Blanche explained that at picking, the estate brought in well under a quarter-ton of fruit per acre. The wines as a group are lighter, higher in acid and less demonstrative in botrytized complexity than a “classic” vintage might produce. That is not to say, however, that they are without richness, and, if different in their brighter, less-unctuous styles, they are fascinating variations on a theme.

As afternoon turned to dusk and things wound down to a close, we overheard the tiresome, downright boring California-versus-France debate starting as the participants made their ways out the doors. A moron’s argument, I thought. I would no more abandon great Napa Cabernet than I would the splendid wines we had just tasted. My ombibulous world has space for both Bordeaux and Napa and room left over for the likes of the ice-cold, early-evening Martini that proved the perfect balm to my tannin-numbed tongue.

Monday Manifestos
The Threat of Intolerance

Mon, 24 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

One of the first lessons we learn in wine appreciation is that there can be no disputes in matters of taste. Your palate is not my palate and my palate is not my brothers’ palates. My sister-in-law has a pretty good palate, but not my brothers.

I have two brothers. One thinks that the higher the tannin and the higher the oak, the better the wine. No one else in the family wants to drink the wines he likes. I keep a few overwrought Petite Sirahs on hand to make him happy when he and his wife come to call. The second brother isn’t much of a drinker at all—which is a great surprise to all who knew him in high school. These days he drinks whatever I am drinking. If we go out to dinner, and I have a glass of bubbles to start, he drinks half of it. If I order a single-malt, he drinks half of it. If we go out for burgers and I order a beer, he drinks half of it. We have no disputes in matters of alcohol taste because he never orders any.

But the world is not always a neat and orderly place, and while I have known for decades that asking people to agree on such matters is a fool’s errand, I have grown increasingly uncomfortable with the rhetoric in the wine business. I have a friend, and she will likely complain that I am picking on her if she reads today’s rant, who hates Rombauer Chardonnay. Nothing wrong with that. Rombauer Chardonnay is unabashedly sweet. Never mind that it is also high enough in acidity that its overall balance would make many Pinot Gris and some Rieslings seem soft by comparison. The wine is sweet, and that bugs her. But she is smart enough to accept that large numbers of the wine-drinking world like Rombauer Chardonnay and that they are no more wrong for that than she is right for being addicted to high acid wine like Chablis.

Here is where the discussion gets off the track for me. In my Thursday blog, I listed a bunch of Syrahs that I like, that I find decently balanced, well-focused and useful. I have been in this business of wine evaluation for almost four decades now. Yet, someone who should know better called those wines “monstrosities”. Now no one told that gentleman to like those wines. They are wines I have liked in my professional work. They are clearly not his favorites. But, labeling them as “monstrosities” has the sadly deleterious effect of ending the conversion. Not only has a matter of taste become boldly disputatious, but it has also become insulting—and not just to me, but to the thousands of people who happen to like those wines.

The threat to civility in conversion exists everywhere in our world. Those words do not come close to what goes on in the political arena, but they sadden me nonetheless. If we cannot have a discussion of about wine styles without denigrating each other’s choices, then we will find ourselves sinking into a morass which will make wine talk far less enjoyable and enlightening that it ought to be.

Sunday Serendipity
The Cellar Key

Sun, 23 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We remember when, not so long, we would sit and wonder how in the world we ever managed to get by without fax machines, and, yes, we remember our first computers and the astonishing new-found ability to transmit text with but a keystroke or two. Now, it is smart phones, I-Pads and wireless devices of all kinds and with them have come hundreds if not thousands of applications for cataloging, researching and retrieving wine information that continues to change the way in which we access everything we could possibly want to know about wine.

A new data platform launched late last year by Scanbury and the Lion Nathan Wine Group caught our eye, and it is one of the most potentially useful and innovative ideas we have yet seen. The Cellar Key is designed specifically for smart phones that can read 2D barcodes and essentially consists of a bottle neck tag on which is a digital code. You simply scan the code with a smart phone to download and instantly view a “meet the winemaker” profile, a video winery tour, food and wine recommendations, and reviews about a given wine.

The first wines to come with Cellar Key labels include Pinots Noirs and sparkling wines from Oregon’s Argyle winery, Australia’s Hallet Shiraz and Poacher’s Blend, the Wither Hills Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand and Argento’s Argentine Malbec., with others to come in 2011.

As we said, we have seen more than a few wine-information platforms, and this one strikes as one that could become a major factor in the exchange of wine information right at the point of sale. Wines tagged with the Cellar Key can be found in at The Mollie Stone’s and K & L Wines in San Francisco, and we will be watching to see if and when others come on board. The technology looks good on its face, and we suspect that it might well, in one guise or another, be embraced by many wineries and wines. Time will tell.

The Cellar Key claims to allow you to explore a winery in the palm of your hand, and it makes good on that promise. You can learn more and even download a 2D reader at the Cellar Key site. The key to its long-success, of course, will be measured by what inroads it makes across the entire wine spectrum.

www.thecellarkey.com

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Zinfandel Pays A Visit

Fri, 21 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Zinfandel began to change about twenty years ago when many wineries discovered that elevated ripeness also meant more intense flavors. Those intense flavors found a willing audience, but, at the same time, drove away many of its staunchest fans. Zinfandel has become a wine for drinking, not for savoring. Perhaps that explains why the Zinfandel days coming to San Francisco next week will be attended by tens of thousands of people who could not care less what the wine geeks are drinking this month.

And it surely explains why Connoisseurs’ Guide continues to help sponsor the several events presented to the world by ZAP, Zinfandel Associates and Producers. Zinfandel is for drinking, and there is no better choice for red-sauced foods and savory pork dishes than a zesty Zinfandel.

Zinfandel is no long a favorite tipple of the wine geeks. It is rarely a wine you would want to put in your cellar for two decades. It is more likely to work with pizza and pasta, barbecued spare ribs and shish kebab than it is with filet mignon, crown rack of lamb or a lombata veal chop napped with a cognac cream sauce.

I once asked a group of Aussie writers and winemakers what they drink with pizza and pasta and they answered “beer”. I had been expecting the answer to be Shiraz (Syrah), a wine that I like but do not choose it for red-sauced dishes.

There are three events that are almost unrivalled in their enjoyment. On Thursday evening next, GOOD EATS AND ZINFANDEL allows dozens of wineries to show off their wines in combination with foods prepared by a series of top restaurants. This is a very relaxed affair with smaller crowds and plenty of opportunity to chat with the winemakers while enjoying specially prepared dishes designed to go with the wines being presented.

Friday night’s EVENING WITH THE WINEMAKERS is a little on the fancy, black tie side for my blood, but it is always popular and allows attendees to sit with the winemakers while enjoying a special dinner as well as participating in the auction for a couple of dozen special items ranging from travel to artist painted bottles to unique dinners.

Saturday brings the grand tasting featuring hundreds of producers. There is more Zinfandel than anyone can possibly try, so most folks taste their favorites and then search out releases from new wineries. You can also participate in the silent auction for over 90 separate lots of Zinfandel.

We have attended and help to sponsor the ZAP festival for a decade and half. These events are a lot of fun, and you will find us there at the Connoisseurs’ Guide table. For more information and tickets, go to the ZAP website at www.zinfandel.org.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
My Running Argument With Dan Berger

Thu, 20 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Dan Berger is a winewriter on a mission. He wants us to listen—to him. And he offers opinions, often pointed, on almost anything in the wineworld. Dan is greatly admired by some; amusing to others; and, the source of much controversy when he speaks. I like Dan. We are great buddies. We argue every time we see each other; then we hug and go our separate ways with no rancor. But that does not change the fact that I often find Dan a little over the top in his opinions.

Let’s be clear. Dan is not always wrong anymore than I am always right, and we do agree with each other from time to time. One of his latest essays is a good case in point. It is entitled “The Blanding of American Wine”.

Dan reaches the titular conclusion because he came across a Tweet (surely a source of respected thought about wine) in which the “tweeter” criticized Syrah for having a peppery character. OK, so far Dan and I agree. Any supposed taster who complains about Syrah with a peppery note to its personality does not understand the grape. Plain and simple.

So far, so good. But then Mr. Berger creates a house of cards without the least bit of foundation, for his conclusions. Let’s start with the first conclusion. Berger states in no uncertain terms, with not so much as a bit of equivocation or eye to the larger world that “ the comment . . . . led me to conclude that the blanding of American wine was nearly complete”.

OK, Dan, hold on. You have pretty much laughed out loud at the “pepper” comment by the tweeter. You have held him in contempt (‘mindless commentary”) in an article in an important newspaper. And now you want us to believe that this know-nothing, this uneducated amateur of a tweeter is proof of anything? Sorry, old buddy, but that does not wash for me. You know better. I know better. The makers of scores of good California Syrahs know better. Certainly there are too many Syrahs that do not measure up just as there are tasters whose palates are not ready for the big time, but nothing in that tweet remotely suggests that American wine has turned into pablum. If anything, the tweetster was upset because his Syrah was not pablum.

But, there is more. Dan is involved in many of the public “county fair” judgings and events of that ilk. He is respected widely for being organized, smart, fun to be around most of the time. In case it was not clear the first time I said it, I like Dan Berger. We always find a way to have a laugh in the midst of our debates and to part ways with a hug and smile.

Well, in his essay in question, Dan then goes on to describe tasting some thirty “expensive” Syrahs and concludes, based on those wines and without naming them, that “U.S. winemakers are happiest when they can make massive wines with high alcohols and damn the torpedoes”. This is a familiar complaint from my friend, Berger, who is also the man who called Napa Valley Cabernets “a parody of themselves”. OK, I get it, Dan, you do not like big wines. I can have no complaint with that idea. It’s your palate. Like what you like. Don’t like what you do not like.

But here is the kicker. Based on those thirty unidentified wines, Dan wants us to know that most of them don’t taste like Syrah. Or to be more accurate, they do not taste like Syrah according to what he wants Syrah to taste like. Dan and I rarely agree about California wine, and while Connoisseurs’ Guide has long championed balance and depth in wines, we also appreciate that our wines do not need to, indeed, cannot imitate European wine. They are ours and they can be in balance at higher ripeness levels.

Still, I could live with the Berger conclusions had he not gone too far. What these wines lack, Berger contends, is varietal aromas. Now, admittedly, I was not there, and Dan has not told us which wines he tasted.

But, I will say this without reservation. The pages of Connoisseurs’ Guide are full of great Syrahs that are high in varietal content—black pepper, leather, game, specifically varietal fruit. They come from wineries like Failla, JC Cellars, DuMol, The Ojai Vineyard, Stolpman, Beckmen, Adelaida, Lewis, Ridge, Rockblock, Red Car, Big Basin, Krupp Brothers, Paul Hobbs, Eric Kent, Baileyana, Morgan, Cadaretta, Qupe, Neyers, MacRostie, Joseph Phelps—and those are just the first two dozen names that come to mind.

Dan is right. The tweetster has offered us mindless commentary. How that creates a case for concluding that Syrah is nearly universally boring and personality deficient is beyond my ken however.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Ridge and The Girl and the Fig

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

My associate, Steve Eliot, usually pens the wine and food columns. Steve, as you may know, toils mightily for CGCW but also teaches wine appreciation to the chefs-to-be at the California Culinary Academy. Wine and food pairings are always part of his classes, and, truth be known, he is not only a very good cook in his own right, but a very adventurous cook and a lover of complex flavors. But today, he is under the weather, and I was prepared to have us miss a day when a most tasty email showed up in my inbox.

Ridge Vineyards was writing to announce its new Syrah-Grenache, and that title in the inbox attracted my full attention all by itself. Not only is Ridge one of the highest achieving wineries in these pages ever, but its devotion to California’s oldest vines in good locations makes the announcement of this new wine all the more exciting. Connoisseurs’ Guide, perhaps even more than wine marketplace, likes well-made Syrah and finds many of the highly ripened examples to be perfectly useful with a variety of flavorful foods. To be sure, we continue to champion wines of balance, and Ridge manages, more than most producers, to find ways to capture full flavors in its wines while avoiding the upper alcohol levels.

And then there is Grenache. Most Grenache in California ranges from dreadful to dull. But, it is not the variety’s fault so much as planting and viticultural decisions that have held it back. That coupled with the fact that few wineries have ever really tried to unlock the beauty that Grenache can produce, and you have what has looked like a grape that is no more at home in California than is Nebbiolo. But as our tastings of Grenache over the last couple years have shown, when planted right, the grapes will produce very fine wine—wine with attractive fruit flavors, pleasing balance and a texture that reminds in ways of Pinot Noir. And with those findings in hand, Connoisseurs’ Guide has concluded that we want to see more and more Grenache migrating to coastal locations where the climate will nurture rather than burn out the grape’s essence.

Now there is Ridge Syrah-Grenache, and while the tale is only finally told when the wine is tasted blind, we are going to be moving directly into our Rhone-grape tastings and hope that this new combination of grape with potential and winery with track record proves as interesting in the bottle as they seem to be at this encounter with the announcing email.

The food pairing aspect here is provided by The Girl and The Fig (recommended to you just ten days ago in this space). The restaurant has had a chance to try the new wine and recommends it with its Braised Lamb Shanks served over mashed potatoes. You can access the recipe here, http://www.ridgewine.com/ridge_vineyards_events/syrah_grenache_lamb_shanks.tml, and I can tell that it will soon appear on the table Chez Olken.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
The Hosemaster of Wine Pays A Visit

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Once upon a time, in the land of milk and honey and overripe Zinfandel, a superhero rode into town, and in no time at all, became known far and wide as The Hosemaster of Wine. He was no ordinary master of wine, stuffed with book learning and overburdened by dozens of Riedel glasses and decanters. No, this man had no need for the fol-de-rol of wine. He was the master of the hose. And as every winemaker who ever pitched yeast or punched down a tank of Cabernet or pumped a red wine into a white wine tank and reinvented rosé before the very eyes of his startled employer can attest, a man who masters the hose is perhaps the most valuable member of the winery staff.

Such a man exists. But, he did not stay long in the winery. His fame spread far and wide, and soon he became that most dreaded of all members of the wine community, a blogger. Yes, the wine blogosphere claimed yet another victim. Thousands of words read by hundreds of people who offered nothing in return except a few laughs. And then there were those who did not laugh. “You’re just lucky I have a sense of humor” wrote one who obviously was short on that very element. Said another, “I must say you are an idiot. I've never liked you. I have no idea why people find you funny.”

Well, so much for the praise. Ultimately, and for reasons which he cannot explain except possibly that we are all as mad as he is, the Hosemaster began to attract a rabid audience, made up mostly of people who once read Mad Magazine as kids. And then, at the height of his popularity, the Hosemaster disappeared. Rumors that he had been spotted pulling hoses in Australia were soon proven to be as upside down as the wine from that distant place. Predictions that he would re-emerge as one of the characters in his short stories also turned out to be wishful thinking. Yes, the Hosemaster was gone.

Until now, that is. I awoke the other morning to the sound of my email alarm bell ringing. I try not to pay attention because it mostly announces public relations releases from wineries who have just hired their latest sales person. And if that is not the reason for the email bill to ring, then it is yet another request to become someone’s friend on Facebook. I should like Facebook. I have lots of friends who want to connect to me, but, frankly, I have not given them much reason for encouragement. Maybe now that Facebook, The Movie has become so popular I will have to pay attention.

But, on that foggy morn, a few days ago, something miraculous occurred. The Hosemaster of Wine reappeared. He left me a piece of his mind, and since it is a good thing that I have a sense of humor, I am going to paste his words in below. Sadly, I suspect that this is just a hit and run appearance, but, as one of the faithful, I was delighted to receive it and am even more delighted that he has allowed me to share it with you. For more info about my friend, the hosepuller, visit his website. He may not have posted to it in six months, but there is much mirth to be had there.

Here then, The Return of The Hosemaster---

Oh, there is a wealth of choices I might suggest to you for this week's Best of the Blogs, or as you refer to it at CGCW (pronounced “cuh-gic-wuh”), Tuesday Twaddle.

I’d recommend you begin your blog day over at the inimitable Tom Wark’s Sermontation. Tom virtually began wine blogging, which is why he is particularly reviled. Today’s post is about the Constitution and Tasting Fees. Tom argues persuasively that our Forefathers expressly forbade Tasting Room Fees under the Eighth Amendment which expressly says, “…nor excessive fines imposed…” Oooh, he’s got you there tasting room scum! Tom suggests that consumers refuse to pay tasting room fees, and if they run into problems not to forget their Second Amendment right to wave their arms. Tom’s blog makes one wish there wasn’t a First Amendment.

From Sermontation I’d skedaddle right on over to 1WineDoody for an inside look at selling out. Is it any wonder 1WineDoody was named Best Overall Wine Blog in 2010? Well, yes, it is, but wonder abounds in this crazy world. In today’s post, Doody makes the case for Portuguese white wines. Entitled, “Who You Callin’ VinHo?,” in Doody’s signature Look at Me I’m Hip style, he argues that Vinho Verde belongs at your table, especially since he had to travel to Portugal on their escudo to teach you this. It’s quite a convincing romp, and, best of all, we can look forward to his Tweets about Vinho Verde this coming weekend! Example: “This 2008 Vinho Verde makes me want to rush to the airport and have my junk touched! A+”

After you’ve done your Doody, flip on over to STEVE! No one writes more thoughtful and honest posts than STEVE! He believes firmly in transparency, particularly in his wife-beater shirt. Today’s post finds STEVE! wondering why he doesn’t have more influence in the wine world. I think Cuh-gic-wuh fans will enjoy my thoughtful comment, which I reprint here:

“You’re trying too hard! Stop begging for attention!”

STEVE! persuasively argues that all other ratings besides his are worthless because, though there are understandably differences in opinions about the same wine, only his scores come from a deep, dark, needy place.

I’ve long been an admirer of Samantha Sams Clubage, and her latest post explores just why French wines are better than any other damn wines. It has something to do with the tingling of the little hairs on her girlie parts. As good an explanation of terroir as I’ve ever read ensues, with Samantha taking the position that “terroir is like Dave Mathews.” But she really gets going with her tribute to what Grower Champagnes do to her “bits.” “I’ve got mousse in my caboose,” she begins, “en tirage in my garage.” Yahoo! I love it when she gets down and dirty. This girl writes like a dream, a wet one.

And, finally, for a change of pace, there’s the poetic and beautifully written blog On and On and On and On the Wine Trail in Italy. Alfonso transports us to another time and place in his blog—I think it’s Hooterville circa 1960. Today’s post, “Pasta My Prime,” is a gorgeous lamentation about aging and some other stuff I couldn’t make heads or tails of. The words flow like a busted sewage main, and leaves you thinking, Was that written in Italian or English? A common feeling when perusing the Tuesday Twaddle.

Monday Manifestos
The Sweet Smell of Terroir

Mon, 17 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It happens fairly regularly in our blind tastings. Someone will comment on the probable provenance of one or more of the wines we are tasting. “The tart cherry/sweet cherry smell reminds me of Oregon Pinot Noir”. “That richness, suppleness and focus all smack of central Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon”. “The combination of minerality and hints of tar suggests Amador County Zinfandel”. Not every guess is correct, of course, because it is just not that easy to pick out every small difference, not to mention that each producer brings its own interpretation to the grapes it uses.

Still, if one accepts that growing areas with similar soils, exposures and climate can produce wines with a commonality of character reflective of their shared location, then it is not surprising that some folks, including your faithful editors here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, would argue that “terroir” exists, that it is going to stand out at times and in ways that make it possible for knowledgeable tasters to make the occasional correct identification of a blind-tasted wine’s source. Admittedly, this argument consists of two parts—does terroir exist for some combinations of place and variety and can tasters develop the ability to distinguish the terroir identifiers of West Rutherford Bench Cabernet Sauvignon, for example, from the terroir identifiers of East Rutherford or Howell Mountain or the Alexander Valley.

Connoisseurs’ Guide has been on the side of “terroir”, meaning commonality of character, from the very outset of our publication. In 1976, we published a seminal article on fourteen sub-areas of the Napa Valley deserving of their own separate appellations. Today, virtually all of them exist under the AVA system, and if not always in exactly the shape we described, they do exist. Indeed, at a recent tasting of wines from the newly formed St. Helena AVA, the speaker stood up and quoted that 1976 article. I wish I could say that we identified all those sub-areas on our own, but the truth is that we spent months in conversation with growers, vineyard management companies and leading winemakers before finally coming up with our proposed choices. You see, even decades ago, the people at the heart of the Napa Valley wine industry knew about those differences. So, you can imagine my surprise when my writing comrade, Steve Heimoff, referred to an inquiry he received from the Dutch-based website, QLI, asking “Why do California wines show so little sign, or no sign at all, of terroir?”

Steve first wrote it was obvious that CA wines have terroir, but then he got a little off the track for my taste, and re-establishing that track is what the rest of this rant is about.

Steve then commented that he did not want to tell his European friends that they were all wet so he decided to “deconstruct the argument figure out what it really means”. And to Steve, what those folks were trying to say was that California wines don’t show certain nuances that, say, Bordeaux and Burgundy show.

Regardless of the accuracy of that statement, I think it missed the essence of the argument. It is not that California wines do not have nunace or terroir but that our wines simply do not always IMITATE Burgundy or Bordeaux. They are in the family; they have varietal character that is identifiable; and, they will often express some of the same site-driven characteristics.

It is clear, for example, that good RRV Pinot Noir has many characteristics of good Burgundy. The fact that Francophiles have for years picked out wines like Dehlinger, Gary Farrell, Chalone in blind tastings as being from France is clear evidence that there are similarities enough borne first of varietal adherence, but then also of balance and nuance.

The question of terroir in Bordeaux is a wholly different question. The variations in character in neighboring properties in Bordeaux are often less a product of terroir than of choices in viticulural practice and vinification. And, as anyone who has ever put Left Bank (Cab-based) Bordeaux and Napa Valley (or Ridge) Cabs in the same blind tasting will certainly know, aside from high-alcohol wines (which are not the majority of good CA Cabs), everyone who has ever done this from before the Paris Tasting of 1976 to today, cannot pick them all out correctly.

The bottom line for me then is this: A kindly interpretation of the QLI comments is that they have a lot to learn. An unkind interpretation is that they do not have the slightest idea what they are talking about. Suggestions of amorphous, formless, California wines may be true at some levels, but those suggestions are belied by the evidence when it comes to the choices among CA wines that drive these pages, and, indeed, drive the entire fine wine business in California.

Sunday Serendipity
San Francisco Beer Week

Sun, 16 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Somewhere once in our past electronic ramblings, I believe Charlie called me “omnibibulous”. Just to set the record straight, Mr. Olken, “ombibulous” is the word, and I admit this particular shoe with but one qualification does indeed fit. Coined by the late, great H. L. Mencken, as keen an observer of the American mind as has ever picked up a pen, it is not a word that you will find in the Oxford English Dictionary, but it is, I think, a good one by any measure. “I’m ombibulous. I drink every known alcoholic drink and I enjoy them all”, he proclaimed and would regularly confirm his high-proof convictions with such reminders as the one found in a letter to Upton Sinclair…“as long as you represent me as praising alcohol, I shall not complain.” Now, my little caveat is simply that the alcoholic drink in question must have some quality in its crafting, and, while wine may my tipple of choice and fine spirits will involve in their own special ways, I must confess to enjoying a good glass beer as the occasion and meal may require.

My own odyssey to real appreciation for the brewer’s art has been a long one. I have always enjoyed a mindlessly gulped glass sitting behind home plate with a hot dog in hand, and nothing would so well slake the thirst brought on by any random physical exertion on a hot summer day. But, beer as something that actually had depth and interest and do I dare say complexity, well for me that is a revelation only arrived a handful of years back. Now, I am both intellectually and hedonistically fascinated by the differences among a myriad of top-fermented ales and bottom-fermented lagers and by the limitless options of yeast, hops and mash afforded craft brewers as they pursue their searches for self expression. I am not abandoning wine; I am a not convert. I have, however, become in all ways a wholly rapt fan.

The point of today’s confession? Yes, there actually is one other than pushing words around on a page, and that point is to raise fair warning of a remarkable Bay Area event on the horizon. The San Francisco Brewers Guild is set begin SF Beer Week with a Gala Opening event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on February 11, 2011. Beer Week officially runs from February 11th through the 20th (I know, apparently beer people cannot count or they are simply loathe to limits themselves to a mere seven days.) During that “week”, there will be a great many events celebrating beer in the city that arguably provided the spark for the craft beer revolution with the establishment of Fritz Maytag’s Anchor Brewing way back in 1965. The Opening Gala will this year bring together over thirty specialty brewers from Northern California, many of whom will be pouring exclusive, special release brews in addition to their well-known bottling. There will be a goodly number of local food purveyors hosting special food and beer parings, and a number of “celebrity” brewmasters are slated to attend. Last year’s event sold out quickly, so those who think fine beers and ales are something worthwhile would be advised to take notice, and, until January 31st, the Brewers Guild is offering early-bird discounted admission…and you know, the less you spend on a ticket, the more you can spend on beer.

You will find all the particulars at
http://www.sfbeerweek.org/

Satisfying Saturdays
RN 74—Less Than Meets The Eye

Sat, 15 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

87 RN 74, 301 Mission St., San Francisco, CA 94105, (415) 543-7474
www.michaelmina.net/restaurant.php?restaurant_id=3

By Charles Olken

For the longest time, I have been reading the early reviews and incessant public relations surrounding RN 74 and thinking, “What have I missed?” Great chef in Michael Mina, lots of fancy architectural eye-candy, San Francisco’s leading sommelier in Rajat Parr, a wine list full of attractive choices albeit a bit too Burgundy-oriented for my taste, but overall an experience that I would just as soon not repeat. Still, with all the attention being lavished on RN 74, I ventured forth again, and once again came away happy but essentially unimpressed.

The guiding spirit for our restaurant reviews is to pick out places we like and recommend them to you. I don’t dislike RN 74, but I find it all too reminiscent of a wine dressed up in all the right pieces but not succeeding enough to make me want buy it again. In CGCW parlance, of the type that passes between the editors in our discussions of the wines we are reviewing, RN 74 is never going to hurt your palate, but it does not do enough to find a place in our cellars (or unreserved recommendations).

The positives here are many. The décor is expensive, modern and handsome. The bar scene in lively, and while that is not of great interest to me personally, the space is warm and attractive and the options are plentiful. The menu is about what one would expect of a San Francisco bistro. What’s not to like, you might then well ask.

It is this. The room is open to the street through a continuous wall of plate glass windows. Do I really want to look at an endless procession of public transit vehicles during my $100 per person (all costs included) dinner? It offers a standard bistro menu, one that is put to shame by places like Bottega, Wood Tavern, Perbacco, Chez Spenser, Bay Wolf. Is it worthy of the place, the fanfare, the PR that attends RN 74? My answer is “no”.

If I am a visitor to San Francisco and I want to visit a top wine bar, RN 74 is not likely to disappoint. But, I would choose to eat elsewhere.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Three Favorite Roads Less Traveled

Fri, 14 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Roads in wine country tend to be quite heavily traveled. You can’t travel up Highway 29 or the Silverado Trail in the Napa Valley without running into car after car after car and even tourist buses. The same is true of Highway 12 that runs up the middle of the neighboring Sonoma Valley and other roads that are lined with wineries, restaurants and other tourist attractions.

But, there are less overloaded roads in lots of busy places, and many of them have become real favorites. The attractions include such prosaic things like old barns, land masses that are not all filled with grapes and a look at a quieter way of life. Here are three roads less traveled that attract me when I am in wine country.

Finnell Road, Yountville to Yountville Cross Road to Silverado Trail

I have written about Yountville before and will certainly do so again. It is a place with great restaurants, great wineries, great hotels and great shops. What’s not to like. But, for a fifteen-minute quiet treat. head out of Yountville east and then north on Finnell Road past houses where real people live, old barns and a different look. Eventually, you connect to the Yountville Cross Road heading to the Silverado Trail and you are back in familiar territory.

Highway 128 from Calistoga Through Knights Valley to Jimtown

Calistoga, at the northern end of the Napa Valley, is the perfect bookend to Yountville at the southern end. Its collection of restaurants, wineries, glider rides (worth doing for a soaring look at hillside vineyards and an amazing vista over the northern end of the Valley), mud baths and the usual assortment of attractions for visitors makes it one of the most visited communities in California wine country.

There are actually three fascinating drives out of Calistoga: (a) to the northeast over Mount St. Helena to Lake County; (b) to the west towards Santa Rosa across Petrified Forest Road; and (c) and north along Highway 128 past wineries of note including Storybook Mountain and into the Knights Valley past Peter Michael and White Oak to Jimtown with its quaint, now somewhat touristy but still likeable General Store. This is the way of my choosing, and it is worth taking whenever you are transiting from the upper Napa Valley to anyplace north of Santa Rosa in Sonoma County.

Chalk Hill Road from Windsor to the Knights Valley

Very few people take this road because it winds around, goes past but a few wineries and winds up somewhere that requires you to take another road to get back to the center of civilization. Yet, when the wineries along the way are Chalk Hill, Verité and Lancaster, each of which has earned two and three-star honors, and the road is rustic and peaceful, it is worth the drive when you have the time. Besides, in order to get back, you will almost certainly pass the Jimtown General Store and I cannot remember a time when I have traveled past that emporium without stopping in and wandering around.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Pairing Salmon with Wines of Almost Every Stripe

Wed, 12 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Give this notion some thought. If you were asked to name nature’s perfect foods, what would you say? I have friends who swear that the list starts with bacon. And it is hard to argue that a well-cooked slice of good bacon is anything but delicious. But, for me, even ahead of fois gras, good pastrami, a great root beer float from Michael Mina (if you have not had his version, you have not experienced how good a root beer float can be), the answer is salmon. Salmon crudo, gravlax and smoked salmon, salmon cooked in parchment with spring vegetables, pan-grilled salmon, blackened salmon, salmon brushed with honey and curry, teriyaki salmon, salmon cooked in cream with puffed pastry toasts. Yes, all that and more. Bring it on. I love salmon.

And I love the way salmon works with wine. There are not any absolute rights and wrongs in pairing wine with food. If it works for you, well, it works for you even if you drink Petite Sirah with you fresh-shucked bivalves. Below, I have listed some of my favorite salmon preparations in the first column and have listed the wines I prefer with them in the second column—in mixed up order. If you care to play along, have a go at matching them up. If not move to the next paragraph to learn what happens Chez Olken. Our choices may not work for you, but the Olkens like them.

1. Blackened or jerk-seasoned salmon		A. Crisp Sauvignon Blanc or Chablis
2. Slow-baked salmon with honey and curry		B. Oregon or Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir
3. Smoked salmon on blini with caviar		C. Rich, balanced Chardonnay
4. Salmon cooked in cream		D. Off-dry Riesling
5. Grilled in butter and shallots salmon filet		E. Fuller-bodied, balanced Pinot Noir
6. Parchment cooked salmon		F. Sauternes
7. Salmon with red miso/sesame glaze		G. Sparkling wine, Champagne

I wish I could promise you fame and fortune if you submit your own ideas on these possible pairings, but I can offer tickets to the upcoming ZAP (Zinfandel Advocates and Associates) tasting on Saturday, January 29 in San Francisco. These are $70 tickets, and as a sponsor of the event, Connoisseurs’ Guide has a handful to give away. And we will be there in person, at our table, to meet you. You all come.

Here are the Olkens’ choices.

Blackened Salmon—(1-E) It is now two decades since I was summoned to the Cuvaison winery to lunch with its director so that he could tell me the secret to making CGCW even more successful (more maps was the prescription). We were comfortably seated overlooking the Valley when the main course arrived, a butter-poached, jerk-seasoned salmon. And then came the wine, Cuvaison’s Reserve Cabernet. I cringed. Tannic red with salmon? I was wrong. The wine was not only not tannic but it has a softened richness uncommon to a young Cabernet. Still, most young Cabs are going to be tannic, but rich, deep Pinot Noir, a riper wine from the Anderson Valley or the Russian River Valley or a balanced wine from the Santa Lucia Highlands have turned out to be functional equivalents and further proof that some red wines do indeed go with fish.

Slow-baked Salmon brushed with honey and curry—(2-D) I would like to tell you that the Olkens created the recipe for the dish, but the truth is that we adopted it from the Four Season’s cookbook for pork tenderloins as an attempt to add to our small repertoire of recipes we can serve with Sauternes. It turned out, however, that we needed to overload the salmon with honey to meet the richness of the Sauternes. Off-dry Riesling, even a lighter Spatlese, turns out to work better with this dish that has become a family favorite.

Smoked Salmon on blini with caviar—(3-G) There is no wine that is more consumed by the Olkens than sparkling wine/Champagne. Our subscribers have already figured that out because we review both West Coast bubblies and Champagne every year. We serve cold-smoked salmon, and gravlax when we take the time to make it, with toast points, rolled around a “caviar of black olives and eggplant”, on puff pastry squares with homemade sweet onion pickles. Smoked salmon is one reason why salmon is my favorite food; it is hors d’oeuvre, it is first course and it is second course. It can even be served with Sauternes.

Salmon cooked in cream—(4-F) Now for a little name-dropping. In 1978, just a few years after Connoisseurs’ Guide was started, the Olkens organized a trip across the French winoshere in virtually all parts of that wonderful country. We were helped by the then existing French wine advocacy group in this country. Visits to Bouchard Pere et Fils in Burgundy, to Moncontour and others in the Loire, to Margaux, Petrus and Lynch-Bages in Bordeaux and then to Chateau Climens and Chateau D’Yquem took us finally face to face with the Comtes de Lur-Saluces, owner of D’Yquem. After our tour of D’Yquem, he very generously took us to the famous restaurant in the nearby city of Langon, D’Arroze. He chose two dishes for us. Fois gras, which for the French is a standard, and a piece of salmon filet in cream. From that day forward, we have loved this dish. Not so long ago, we tasted a variant in an East Asian Indian restaurant. There, the salmon was place in a crock of the type that might be used for Onion soup. In this restaurant, however, the fluid was coconut mix lightly seasoned with curry. We have tried several times to replicate this dish but sadly not come close enough.

Salmon filet grilled in butter with shallots—(5-C) Take a nice thick salmon filet. Place it in a black skillet with shallots that have been caramelized along with a couple of pats of butter and grill it up on high heat to crisp the edges and leave the center nice and juicy. For me, a sprinkle of soy and I have a great mate for a rich, balanced Chardonnay, but, frankly, we have enjoyed this dish, family favorite and very often served for ourselves, with wines ranging from bubbly to Riesling to lighter Pinot Noir.

Parchment-cooked salmon—(6-A) Mrs. Olken loves to serve this dish as the first course at sit-down dinners for friends and family. She combines the salmon with spring vegetables and white wine in the parchment, seals it up and bakes it in the oven. The fluid in the “bag” effectively steams the fish and adds the flavors of the veggies. When it gets opened at the table, it is both light and tasty. We like a high-acid white like a brisk Sauvignon Blanc or a Chablis as the wine partner.

Salmon with red miso/sesame glaze—(7-B) There are a variety of salmon preparations that will go well with red wine. This one wants a brighter, acid-edge Pinot Noir like those from Oregon or the Sonoma Coast.

And, now its your turn. Connoisseurs’ Guide has tickets to ZAP for you when you respond with comments and with your own ideas.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Tom Wark on the Constitution and Wine

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have previously praised the writing of Tom Wark, and he has now authored an editorial that I have read twice over. I want you, if you have not done it, to have a look at his very smart writings on his blog, Fermentation, www.fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation.

His recent comments on the Constitution and Wine are of such moment that I am quoting it here in full, and I commend it to you, as well as commending Mr. Wark to you for further readings.

This week, upon being sworn in and taking over control of the House of Representatives, Republicans will take to the floor of the House to read the entire United States Constitution.

What does this have to do with wine?

Not much really, but the relationship between commerce and wine, and the way our Constitution sets up a single economic union, is important for us to be aware of. It's important particularly in 2011 since it is likely that one way or another, the federal government will have something to say about commerce and wine this year.

It is in Article One, Section Eight of the Constitution that we find the Commerce Clause. It reads:

"The Congress shall have Power to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes"

This single sentence in the Constitution was the foundation upon which the Supreme Court determined in 2005 in the Granholm v. Heald decision that, despite the 21st Amendment to the Constitution:

"Time and again this Court has held that, in all but the narrowest circumstances, state laws violate the Commerce Clause if they mandate “differential treatment of in-state and out-of-state economic interests that benefits the former and burdens the latter.”

"Differential treatment" is exactly what existed when states allowed their own wineries and retail stores to ship wine directly to their local residents, but prohibited out-of-state wineries from doing the same. To this point, the Court went on to write:

"This rule is essential to the foundations of the Union...States may not enact laws that burden out-of-state producers or shippers simply to give a competitive advantage to in-state businesses."

The reason this idea of states not interfering with interstate commerce is critical is because without a single economic union that runs across all the United States, we end up with trade barriers that hurt consumers and economic activity. The Court put it succinctly in Granholm when they wrote:

"This mandate “reflect[s] a central concern of the Framers that was an immediate reason for calling the Constitutional Convention: the conviction that in order to succeed, the new Union would have to avoid the tendencies toward economic Balkanization that had plagued relations among the Colonies and later among the States under the Articles of Confederation."

And yet even given this directive by the highest court in the land, interstate commerce in wine remains burdened by state laws that discriminate against interstate commerce, retards the legitimate growth of the American wine market and impedes economic growth. While 37 states now allow their residents to have wine shipped to them from out of state wineries ONLY 13 STATES ALLOW THEIR CITIZENS TO PURCHASE WINE FROM OUT OF STATE RETAIL WINE STORES. And many of these states prohibit their residents from belng shipped wine from out-of-state retail stores while allowing it from in-state stores.

The reason this unconstitutional burden on interstate commerce continues to exist, even in the wake of the Granholm decision is because wholesalers in most states have convinced the legislators to whom they give millions of dollars that the Granholm case did not apply to retail wine store commerce, but rather just to winery/producer related commerce. In addition, consumers and wineries that have benefited greatly from the Granholm decision have not seen a necessity to secure the same right for wine store commerce.

Two events will effect this state of affairs in 2011. The re-introduction of HR 5034 in Congress and the decision of the Supreme Court on whether or not it will hear an appeal of a lawsuit in which a lower court ruled that retailers have no Commerce Clause protection against discriminatory state laws in the same way wineries do.

HR 5034, introduced first last year and that failed to get out of the House Judiciary Committee, would have the effect of officially stripping every single retail wine store in America of its Commerce Clause protection against state "laws that burden out-of-state producers or shippers simply to give a competitive advantage to in-state businesses". HR 5034 is a blatant attempt by beer and wine wholesalers to change the rules in the middle of the game because they are perturbed that the laws they have demanded be passed to help them control the wine market have been called unconstitutional.

HR 5034 is related to the law suit mentioned earlier.

In Wine Country Gift Baskets v. Steen, retailers sued the state of Texas on the grounds that in the face of the Granholm decision, Texas continues to allow its residents to have wine shipped to them from in-state retail wine stores, but prohibits consumers from purchasing wine from out-of-state wine retail stores. A Federal District Court in Texas called this unconstitutional in the same way that a Michigan Federal District Court called a similar in that state unconstitutional. In Michigan, the wholesalers, working hand-in-hand with the Michigan Liquor Control Commission simply stripped all retailers of their right to ship wine to Michiganders in a cynical, anti-consumer, market-disrupting payoff to wholesalers.

However, the Texas decision was overturned by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals that ruled because the Supreme Court had previous mentioned that the Three-Tier System is "unquestionably legitimate" and because direct shipping is part of what retailers do, a state is able to discriminate against out-of-state wine retail stores. The problem with this decision is that the Fifth Circuit failed to even do a simple evaluation of the the Texas State law and its effect on interstate commerce, as they are required.

The Supreme Court has officially been asked to take up this case.

However, if HR 5034 passes, the lawsuit and any hope that the Supreme Court will hear the case will be over. HR 5034 would give congressional approval to the stripping from retailers of their right to be protected from discriminatory state laws. This would be a nearly unprecedented action on the part of Congress that has only stripped a single industry of its Commerce Clause protections once before in the 223-year history of the Constitution.

Having worked with the Specialty Wine Retailers Association for the past three years, I've become somewhat close to this issue. I work with a number of wine retailers across the country who are members of the Association. Their ability to serve a national marketplace in wine is critical for the simple reason that no set of wholesalers in any state can deliver all the wines to retailers that the state's consumers want. However, if a state allows direct shipment from out-of-state retailers, then the entire American wine marketplace is open to consumers and retailers are given the opportunity to serve those consumers.

There is no question in my mind, having read through most of the Supreme Court cases that led up to and including Granholm, that this ongoing discrimination against interstate commerce by wine retail stores in unconstitutional. Nor is there any doubt in my mind that allowing consumers the ability to have wine shipped to them from out-of-state retailers would well serve wine consumers, deliver to the states additional tax revenue and that it can be done in a fashion that allows the state to regulate this brand of commerce.

But just like with HR 5034, American beer and wine wholesalers will continue to work to thwart the will of the American consumer for their own interests by continuing to argue that the Three-Tier System is somehow of greater constitutional importance than the commerce clause.

The fact is, the three tier system in its current form is the single most important impediment to entrepreneurial success in the wine industry. When it is combined with prohibitions on winery or retailer direct shipping, consumers find they have access to a paltry number of wines. Most important, with these restrictions remaining in place, we have a situation where a small group of powerful wholesalers who understand extraordinarily little about wine consumers, control the wine consumers access to wine.

When you listen to the Constitution being read on the house floor, it should be instructional to note that nothing in the Constitution actually prevents this kind of perversion of the American economy by wholesalers. So while wine lovers need to work to protect their interests, they might also want to consider how the Constitution might be changed so that a single group of campaign contributors can't completely control the wine marketplace and how laws effecting that marketplace are passed.

Monday Manifestos
In Praise Of Winemakers

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Now don’t get me wrong. I have no argument with idea that terroir is a significant aspect of fine wine, but it is, to my thinking, only one of the factors in what makes a great bottle great, and all the huffing and puffing on the topic of late generally seems to ignore the role of artful winemaking. “Authenticity”, we are told, is everything, and unless the winemaker’s hand is wholly transparent, then the proper mark has been missed. It is easy enough to walk away from such discussions thinking that anything but the most minimal winemaking is wrong, and that winemakers, and those in California and Australia are the most routinely indicted lot, have broken some covenant with nature as evidenced in their manipulated and grotesque distortions of what the land might be trying to tell us. Too ripe, too oaky, too high in alcohol are the familiar refrains, and, while there are cases enough where such criticisms apply, their incessant invocation winds up damning entire winemaking cultures by implication. We have addressed these issues before and no doubt will again, but today I would like to offer, early in the new year, a few words of appreciation of winemakers and their craft.

Great wine is no more solely defined by material than is fine cuisine, and the finest examples of both are the result of superior ingredients artfully rendered. I will often liken winemakers to chefs when teaching student chefs at the California Culinary Academy, and, just as there is more to a great dish than the ingredients involved, so too is there more to great wine than getting the best fruit. I do not mean to say that my fellow journalists are unaware of the winemaker’s role, it is simply that, when mentioned, winemaking typically seems to be cast in a villainous light. It is never the maker but the terroir that is praised, and I would simply remind that, while to some extent wine can make itself, the most memorable bottles from the finest estates and producers are born of real craft and commitment.

When I go to a great restaurant, I go to see what new doors a chef might open. It is the joy of finding new perspective, of hitherto undiscovered combinations of flavors and textures on the plate, and of seeing the familiar through entirely new lenses. When trying new wines, I am as often as not looking for the same...not to see how well a winemaker adheres to a pre-conceived notion of what a wine of a given locale should be, but something involving, a new variation on a theme that takes me to new places. Yes, when I a pour a Chablis, I expect it to taste like Chablis, and when I feel the need for a fine Rutherford Cabernet, I do have certain expectations, but I do not have an absolute template in mind nor a mindset that I will only enjoy the wine to the degree that it stays within narrow lines. That I find those moments of real discovery and joy is in no small part the result of the winemaker’s art, and, I for one would like to offer to them all a tip of the Connoisseurs’ Guide hat.

Sunday Serendipity
THOUGHTS WHILE SHAVING

Sun, 09 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

You might well ask why a man sporting a beard would write a column called Thoughts While Shaving. After all, if a person has given up shaving, the chances are that he does not do much thinking while staring at himself in a steam-covered mirror, his face slathered with white foam. On the other hand, just because I have eschewed the razor does not mean that I have given up thinking. But, would you read a column called “Thoughts While Watching The Jets-Colts Game”, or “Thoughts While Bed-Ridden”, which both I and my sidekick, Steve Eliot, happen to be this evening. So, this assortment of random thoughts about the wine world is “Thoughts While Shaving”.

My buddy, Steve Heimoff, of the Wine Enthusiast and his own eponymous blog of which I am a great fan, recently commented in said blog that he would not make predictions for 2011 because that was a good way to be wrong, and wrong on the record. Lying here between events in today’s football games and thinking, while under the influence of strong drugs, I will defy the odds and make my own predictions—no explanations, no justifications and no shame. I may feel differently tomorrow, but by then, you will have read these words and I won’t be able to take them back.

Item: The continuing push to open up wine-shipping laws is going to have limited but useful successes in the next year because some state legislatures will put their citizens ahead of the existing distribution system. I wish I could predict great success, but, frankly, these “big business vs. the little man” movements make progress in crablike fashion. Have faith, my readers, sooner or later, the rules are going to change in your favor.

This is the year in which the price spiral reverses its downward trend. Already, Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon that once sold for $4500 a ton and last year was picked up for $1500, is back on the market at $3500. If you were enjoying 2010 because it offered the occasional amazing deal, you might want to seek whichever of them come on the market in the next few months because the end of the year will leave only the true leftovers available to bargain hunters.

If you see any decent wine with a plastic cork in 2011, you can be sure that it is either from a winery that cares more for a cheap plug than for a decent closure—or it is a winery that has not got the message yet. Real cork has weathered the storm of its own failures by resorting to quality control measures that have now reduced the incidence of failure from 3-5% to less than 1%. Of course, those bad results of ten and twenty years ago did invite all kinds of alternative closures into existence. The one that makes the most sense to me, and has convinced me, despite my prejudices, of its worth is the screwcap. Used correctly, for wines meant to be drunk young, I now favor this form of closure. It works. It is easy to remove. I have become used to it. It is not just for plonk anymore.

OK, so I broke my word. There is more discussion than I expected to offer and less pure speculative prediction. But, here is one prediction on which I think you can count. Within the next year, Connoisseurs’ Guide will load and make available to its subscribers, every review we have put in print since our inception in 1974. When it finally arrives, the CGCW data base of past reviews will go back further than any other in print anywhere. You can take that prediction to the bank, folks.

Satisfying Saturdays: Eating Well In Wine Country
89 THE GIRL AND THE FIG

Sat, 08 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

There are three times when the Olkens like to eat at The Girl and The Fig, the Provençal-styled bistro on the Plaza in Sonoma town. The very first time we ventured in was on a weekend visit to wine country. We were taking a lazy approach to Sunday morning having spent all of Saturday running from winery to winery to winery and then some. Time to relax before getting back into the saddle. Brunch turned out to be one of the great treats with its choices of eggs, breads, meats, light salads. It was just what the doctor ordered, and the Rhone-oriented wine list was well-chosen and loaded with some of California’s leading editions of the genre. We chose the JC Cellars First Date blend of Marsanne and Rousanne and could not have been more pleased. For a wine country brunch, The Girl and The Fig deserves two-stars, somewhere around 91-92 points.

Our next visit occurred months later when we met a group of friends for lunch. I spend a lot of time in wine country on business, but I also spend a lot of time in wine country just enjoying the beauty and the wine without going on professional visits. Lunch turned out to be something of a glorified brunch, but pleasant enough and tasty enough. Duck confit and other meats appear, but the tone is still more light and countrified than big-city serious. Bravo for that, and, as an added bonus, if you go when the weather is inviting, you can eat in the tree-shaded backyard. So far, so good.

Last summer, we were on another of those combined weekends where part of the time is spent during “real work”, if one can call tasting at various wineries “work”, and part is spent wandering around anonymously, possible sitting on the veranda at the Ravenswood tasting room or dropping into Bartholomew Park for a peak at the fabulous grounds and small but interesting history museum. We opted for dinner in the backyard, and it was one of those fabulous nights with the sun setting low, the sky blue above and the warmth of the day hanging around to keep everything cozy. But, then came the one surprise. The dinner menu seemed not much more than the luncheon menu, and since the luncheon menu is essentially light and pleasant, but far from extending itself, the dinner menu simply did not go far enough to invite a leisurely two-hour sitdown. Dining is part recreation. Dinner at The Girl and The Fig, while very pleasant, especially in the backyard on a balmy evening, needs to be more than a glorified lunch. It is not that we went away unsatisfied with our choices, but cold, flaked tuna on toasted sour dough is not exactly an inspired offering. So, we have that small bitch. Now, we go for dinner when we want a light meal after a heavy day—nothing wrong with that, but not what we typically want for recreational dining in wine country.

So, bits of mixed messages add up to a good overall score but one that could have gone higher. And because The Girl and The Fig stands as a family favorite brunch, I strongly recommend that you consider that option fully on weekends in and around Sonoma town.

The Girl and the Fig
110 West Spain Street, Sonoma, (707) 938-3634
www.thegirlandthefig.com

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Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Placerville: Wine Country on the Way to Ski Country

Fri, 07 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I used to think of Placerville as a place to get gas on the way Lake Tahoe, and whether I was headed to up to skiing at Heavenly in mid-winter, as has been threatened by my kids and grandkids or for a summertime layaround on the shores of the Lake, there was not much reason to stop for long in and around Placerville, the several block long commercial district immediately adjacent to Highway 50 about halfway from the Bay to the Tahoe Basin.

That was before I discovered wine and the wine industry discovered, or indeed, rediscovered the potential to make really interesting wine in the Sierra Foothills. Now, I find Placerville irresistible, whether for a great cup of “joe” or glass of wine. But, Placerville itself, as nice as it is with its small town charm, is not what really gets me out of my car at midpoint from here to there. It is the wineries that sit just off Highway 50 just north of Placerville in the Apple Hill District. Although not afforded its own AVA as yet, but deserving of one in my mind as the home to dozens of producers including the well-known Lava Cap and Madrona wineries. Nearby are such stalwarts as Boeger and Miraflores.

Picnicking on the deck at Lava Cap is one of our favorite stops, but, frankly, we have also simply pulled off the road into the Apple Hill area and found a vista under a friendly shade tree in midsummer for our break from traffic and sitting in one place for hours.

If you find yourself heading up to the Sierras via Highway 50, now the Olken’s preferred route instead of the freeway conditions on I-80, and you want a break, think Placerville, and in particular think Apple Hill and its neighbors.

Check out these websites for more details:
www.applehill.com/
www.visit-eldorado.com/

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Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
The Zester Daily Zings The New Somms

Thu, 06 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

“A little knowledge is dangerous thing”.

The oft-times brilliant young wine writer, Jordan Mackay, whose comments on California wine last month rather bugged me, has this month hit the ball out of the park with his insightful evaluation of the new crew of young sommeliers. He offers plenty of anecdotes about eager beavers whose enthusiasm ultimately leads them into what he, and I, would consider to be mistakes and disservices to their customers and even to their employers. He asks for wisdom, not just a little knowledge. Thank you, Jordan. Spot on.

The article can be found at: http://www.zesterdaily.com/zester-soapbox-articles/777-sommelier-training

It grades out at straight A for me.

He could not be more correct. We see it all the time here in San Francisco where good restaurants wind up with novices for sommeliers. And it is easy to understand why that happens. The notion that a restaurant can sell more wine with an extensive list and person on the floor to push that list is probably more accurate than not. But so much depends on the how well-trained the buyer/sommelier happens to be and on the whether that person understands that it is all about the customers and not about trying to prove that two years in the wine trade and one course in wine service has made a novice into a rock star. I like Jordan’s anecdotes, but I like mine better because I have seen them first hand.

--The very good restaurant Jardiniere has one of San Francisco’s more noted sommeliers. He is no novice, but he is guilty nonetheless of what I call “sommelier hubris”. As the result, I will not eat at Jardiniere because when my wife and dined there a few years ago, the wine list was so filled with bottles from vinous backwaters that I felt very little connection to it. And while I won’t claim to be a world expert, I am no novice, and if I cannot relate to a wine list, then what happens to the ordinary punters like my neighbors—educated, urbane but not students of the wines of Puglia or Greece or Tasmania or the Jura? I do not even question that some of those wines, or even most of them, are good wines, but I do question the hubris that causes a smart wine person, or a novice, to produce a list that requires an Master of Wine degree to understand.

--One of my favorite restaurants over the past five years was Myth in San Francisco. I loved its décor; I loved its homey yet sophisticated menu. In short, Myth was on the way to becoming my “go to” San Francisco restaurant. But Myth had at time a young sommelier whose desire to show off exceeded his wisdom. The list itself was a mix of accessible and abstruse, and, frankly, I not only have no problem with that, but rather like it when one can choose between a known entity like Shafer Merlot and rarely seen offerings like Robert Foley Merlot. Still, on my first visit, this young somm, whom I saw grow in smartness over time, was asked (I like to ask the sommelier to choose a special bottle for the dishes we are eating because first of all, he knows his list and secondly, if I want to extend my knowledge, why not ask the man who put the list together). Well, my young friend chose a Taurasi, a tight, angular, tannic wine from the Avellino region of Italy. It was absolutely the wrong thing to serve with the melt-in-your mouth short ribs despite its depth and potential. On my next visit, the somm was faced with a more daunting task. Three of us showed up after a tasting in San Francisco, immediately asked for three wine lists and that event by itself sent our waiter screaming into the night to be followed almost immediately by the arrival of the somm. We all collectively discussed menus and wine choices and hit upon the idea of several courses of shared plates. The wine choices were also a mix of our preferences and his suggestions, and the aforementioned Shafer vs Foley choice of Merlot was solved by the somm recommending the Foley and agreeing to swap it out for the Shafer if we decided that we preferred the Shafer after tasting the Foley. By the time of my third visit, the somm recognized me and brought me a glass of his latest discovery, a Sonoma Mountain Grenache. Now, here was a hit. Balanced, ripe but not over the top and showing all of the potential that Grenache offers when grown in the right places. My young friend is still in the learning phase but he has grown with experience, and with the closing of Myth, he moved on to a role as one of several “floor somms” at the fabulous restaurant, Gary Danko.

--Two final notes: Two Olken family favorite restaurants, Bay Wolf in Oakland (and highly recommended to you in an earlier restaurant review in this blog) and the well-run East Asian Indian restaurant, Ajanta, in Berkeley, have wine lists of about sixty wines, all fairly priced, and chosen not by a young somm trying to show off but by the restaurant owner himself. Both lists have familiar and unfamiliar wines and both take in a wide geographic swath. These are the kinds of lists that are meant to serve the clientele while allowing the restaurant to stretch a little. And, even when a list is six hundred long or even several thousand, there is no reason why it cannot be geared to the clients instead of to the ego of the somm.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Pigs and Pinot

Wed, 05 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It was the title of one of the best-ever episodes of Bravo‘s Top Chef, it is the name of Chef Charlie Palmer’s annual celebration of Pork and Pinot Noir at Sonoma’s Hotel Healdsburg, and it is one of my favorite food and wine combinations of them all. If, in fact, there are any marriages made in heaven, my first vote is for the pig and Pinot match. There is something about the inherent sweetness of well-cooked pork that plays to the juicy, ripe-cherry themes of good Pinot Noir, and, in turn, Pinot’s slight tilt to acid helps the wine cut through pork’s fatty richness. For all of that richness, however, pork is not a meat that likes to be around a great deal of tannin, and few varietals other than Pinot seem to afford so much depth and compelling vinous range while keeping astringency to such a comfortable minimum.

I have lavished praise on Pinot before and expect that I will as long as new bottles make their ways to our table, but I am little transfixed by the grape these days as we wrap up our tastings for the February issue of Connoisseurs’ Guide which features, (you guessed it,) new Pinot Noir. What that means, too, is that we have a bounty of bottles that are far too good to be dumped down the drain after tasting, and, while you might think that we would tire of a steady diet of Pinot, I would simply say, think again.

Now, I do not mean to imply that we are eating pork each and every night over the last couple of weeks, and I can testify to the fact that Pinot is tasty with veal, beef, lamb and the occasional plate of salmon, but, yes, pork has been front and center of late in a good many guises. Last week, we roasted a crackling, skin-on picnic, the lower section of a shoulder of pork, and, both the initial meal and leftover reworkings ranging from savory pork sandwiches to a meaty mix of black-eyed peas and pork to a saucy, African ground nut stew have been happy mates to bottlings from DuMol, Merry Edwards, Hartford Court and Russian Hill.

On a late evening after an especially long day, quickly sautéed boneless chops dressed with a pan sauce of shallots, butter, white wine, mustard and cream took us through one bottle of Williams Selyem Pinot and into another. It has been said in some quarters that Cabernet Sauvignon appeals most to the intellect while Pinot plays to the sensualist in us all, and, if such nostrums do wander a little too far into the realm of the wine geek, I confess to understanding what is meant by those claim it.

And, while on the topic, those who are similarly smitten by the grape should check their calendars and make plans is at all possible to attend Chef Palmer’s sixth annual Pig and Pork extravaganza in Healdsburg on March 18 and 19 this year. Nancy Oakes, Marc Forgione and the Voltaggio brothers, Michael and Bryan will head up a list of participating chefs, and winemakers Merry Edwards and Tom Rochioli are among those tagged to host winemakers’ dinners. All proceeds from the two-day event go to Share Our Strength and local Healdsburg educational foundations, so the cause is every bit as good as the food and wines that the event celebrates

Here is a link for more information.
http://www.hotelhealdsburg.com/pigsandpinot/

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
THE WINE ECONOMIST
www.wineeconomist.com

Tue, 04 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

If you are a frequent visitor to this place, you probably know that I was, in my early professional career, a practitioner of the dismal science known as “economics”. It was not long, however, before wine collecting graduated first from recreation into passion and then into a second career in wine journalism. That all happened several decades ago, but the economist in me never seems to let go. Oh, I try to fight it. I try to stick to my last as wine critic and experienced observer. I just do not always get it right.

Lately, I have been getting my economics fix at a website and blog written by a real economist. Mike Veseth is a Professor of International Economics at the University of Puget Sound and the author of several books that attempt to explain his and my dismal science. To his everlasting credit, Veseth is now in the midst of authoring something a bit tastier entitled Wine Wars: The Curse of the Blue Nun, the Miracle of Two Buck Chuck and the Revenge of the Terroirists.

His website proclaims itself to be what you get when you cross the Wine Spectator with The Economist, and while it is perhaps a little easier to grasp than The Economist, it is clearly a lot deeper than any kind of analysis you are likely to read in the Spectator. In short, his blog, The Wine Economist is a smart and easy read, and it is just what a thoughtful wine blog ought to be. It explains, it challenges, it expands our understandings of the wine world.

His most recent entry is entitled “There’s (Wine) App For That” in which the good professor relates the findings of students in his The Idea of Wine class in which several research papers probe the intersection of wine and technology. There is much to be learned here just as there is much thinking required in response to his blog entry, The Paradoxx of Wine Choice.

Clearly, this is a thinking person’s wine blog with much that will draw you in. And it is this week’s Best of the Blogs.

The Wine Economist
www.wineeconomist.com

Monday Manifestos
2011—The Year The Sun Came Back Out

Mon, 03 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is hard to imagine it in the midst of a San Francisco winter, but 2011 will be the year the sun comes back out for the California wine industry. No matter that the skies have not yet fully accepted the message. We expect them to weep in Winter. Indeed, we need them to open up and wet down everything in sight because we know that it never rains in California in the summertime. That is why so many of us came here in the first place—we like the natural beauty of the place, we like the amazing diversity of people and experiences, and, yes, we like the weather that allows us to be out of doors all winter and to stay out in the noon-day sun of summer without being accused of being either mad or English.

For reasons that only “Mother” knows, 2010 was the year in which the sun refused to shine. Not only did old Sol not ripen the grapes according to schedule but, when at least, the dear boy deigned to make an appearance, it was if he was trying to make up for months of bad behavior by overachieving and thereby burning up a fair bit of the crop in a blaze of inglory. To be sure, we know that the early-ripening varieties generally faired better than the late-hanging reds, and we know that the tale of the vintage is not writ in the weather report but in the resulting wine. But, even if 2010 ultimately performs adequately, it will not have been with the normal help from the sun.

Of course, the gloom of 2010 went far beyond what was happening to vineyards and grapes. This was also a challenging sales year, and we have seen wineries slide from existence, while others have had to retrench and hang on by their fingernails. Perhaps because the industry has been so incredibly prosperous for the past decade and more, we did not see the wholesale slaughter that had been predicted by the purveyors of doom and gloom. In that regard, even without a lot of financial sun, the industry has turned out in 2010 to have been a little bit like the vintage—far from optimal but not as bad as predicted.

And now it is 2011. The economic tides are turning. Many of our retail and winery contacts report their best Holiday seasons in a couple of years, and even if the next twelve months are merely periods of getting financial feet back on the ground and building a base for the next decade, every indication is that the national economy and the California wine industry economy have turned the corner and are in full rebound mode.

Now, it is up to old Sol to do his thing. We have had a series of cool vintages here in California, but, they generally have been of average to exceptional (see 2007) in quality. We expect nothing less in 2011 because this is the year that the sun will come back out.

Sunday Serendipity
Rye Whiskey

Sun, 02 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It is without parallel or precedent in Europe, and it was the American whiskey of choice prior to the repeal of Prohibition. It was impossible to find more than a literal handful of bottlings a decade ago of which few if any might be regarded as quality stuff. Rye whiskey was a forgotten piece of the past, but it is now undergoing a real revival in interest as curious drinkers and craft distillers redefine what can only be called an American classic.

In the United States, “Rye Whiskey” is distilled from a mash made up of at least 51% rye, whereas Bourbon is principally born of corn, and, much like Bourbon, it is aged in new, charred-oak barrels. If allowed at least two years of barrel time, it can then be called “Straight Rye Whiskey”. Rye makes for a spicier, less-sweet spirit than corn, and, when given time in oak, shows remarkable complexity and richness. The finest efforts deserve being drunk neat and savored, but the spicy aspects of rye whiskey make it an interesting component of whiskey-based cocktails such as the Old Fashioned and the classic Manhattan.

Two recent bottlings of note appeared under my tree this holiday season, and both earn enthusiastic thumbs-up recommendation. The first, Rendezvous rye from High West Distillery, is blended and bottled by Utah’s first licensed distillery since the end of Prohibition. It is a wonderfully complex blend of six- and sixteen-year-old whiskeys whose uncommonly high percentage of rye, its creators proudly point out, far exceeds the legal 51% minimum, and there is no question but that is has a decided spiciness and depth all its own. It sells locally for between $45.00 and $50.00 a bottle, a price that is entirely fair for what comes across in the glass. My second surprise of the season, and one which will be enjoyed infrequently and in small doses, is the extraordinary Black Maple Hill 23-year-old Rye. It is, quite simply, one of the richest, most flavorful and singularly complex whiskies in my experience, and it is not one that I will be using in mixed drinks! It smacks of vanilla, new leather, dried oranges, maple sugar and a touch of tobacco, and, despite showing the polish of over two decades of aging, it still displays the wild spark and spice unique to good rye. It is not cheap at $125.00 to over $200.00 depending where found, and its finding is bound to take a bit of a search, but it is a compelling reminder that there are times when real art can be found in the distiller’s craft.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Quick Tips When Visiting Wine Country

Fri, 31 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

As is the case with just about any topic these days, there is no dearth of advice and opinion on the internet when it comes to touring California’s wine country. As you jump from one site to another, it is impossible to miss one almost universal recommendation, that of the need for planning. Now, we will often make spur-of-the-moment visits to this or that winery while doing the business that we do, but we could not agree more that a bit of planning and foresight will make for a far more memorable visit whether a quick day away or a longer vacation. The point is that California wine country is a big place, there are countless wineries waiting and more than a few other things to do while there.

Every six weeks, I start a new class on wine appreciation for student chefs at the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, and, like clockwork on the first day, I am met by lots of raised hands and eager questions of where to go, when to go and how best to make the most of a visit.

The most important piece of advice I can offer is to pace yourself and simply not try to do too much. I have always thought it best to limit a visit to no more than three wineries in a day. There are folks that seem to think the point is to see as many wine wineries as possible, and I have known some to aim for six to ten at a time, but, even if successfully making such a mad dash from place to place, there is simply no way to come to any real appreciation of the wines and the people who make them when on such a hectic place. And, pace, it should go without saying, is important when it comes to tasting!

I would also urge would-be visitors to get a good map and key on a specific district rather than scrambling from one valley to another and ultimately spending more time in transit than anything else. Do not try to race from Carneros to Calistoga to Russian River in the same day if you want to feel that you have really learned something about a place. Pick a place, take a more leisurely pace and spend some time listening, tasting and soaking up all that your hosts have to offer. And, do not forget, that wine country, from Anderson Valley in Mendocino to Sonoma’s Healdsburg and Napa Valley’s Yountville is home to a wealth of world-class eateries that will make touring all the more memorable yet. Before heading out, take the time to check out your destination of choice and see what other attractions it might afford. A good way to do just that is to either check a winery’s website or give them a call. Most will be happy to let you know all of the reasons that they believe their particular corner of the world is the most special one to be found. Calling for an appointment, in fact, is always the best tactic insofar as many wineries will receive visitors by appointment only, while others may have special events and tastings planned that might be otherwise missed.

Finally, on the topic of the best time to visit, the simple answer is that each season has its own virtue. We are partial to early Spring when bud break commences, the vineyards are blanketed in blooming mustard and vacation-time tourism is low, and excitement of harvest against the backdrop of Autumn colors is a time that must be experienced by every wine lover. Winter in the vineyard may not be the most picturesque time of the year, but things are slower, reservations and accommodations are easier and less expensive to get, and those who are less than taken by large crowds will find the pace very much to their liking

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Does Cabernet Need Saving? Has Chardonnay Failed?

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A couple days back, I stumbled across and was very much taken with a discussion on Tom Wark’s Fermentations site of a recent Wines and Vines editorial by Leo McCloskey of Enologix. It seems that Mister McCloskey has raised a warning to Napa Valley Cabernet producers to institute a formal “classification” system whereby to differentiate Napa from California and, presumably, afford some hierarchical ranking of the Valley’s Cabernets. The reason for such warning is what Mr. McCloskey believes is the immanent commoditization of Cabernet and resultant loss of quality, a scenario he likens to what happened California Chardonnay over the past decade. A classification system, he offers, is the best way in which Cabernet can be saved. McCloskey’s article, while not very long, is rife with ideas for debate. The issue of “classification”, what standards might be used and just who would do the classifying is a fascinating one, and Tom Wark has more than a few observations well worth noting. I have a few of my own but will save that topic for another time, as I am both puzzled and troubled by the very premise of said need and question whether Cabernet requires saving and that Chardonnay has failed because it was not “saved”.

The gist of the argument goes something like this: California Chardonnay in general and Napa Valley Chardonnay in particular declined in quality (and worth?) over the last decade due to New World overplanting, and Cabernet is heading down the same path. The “proof” we are offered of Chardonnay’s diminished state is a loss of profits on the part of growers, a 50% reduction in 90-plus scores by the Wine Spectator over the last decade, and a randomly tossed-in desultory comment from the New York Times that Chardonnay’s “almost effortless popularity as a mass-market white also brought it the mark of infamy.” Huh? First, I see no problem with well-made mass-market wines, and I constantly hear those in the business of wine bemoaning the woefully small base of Americans who make wine a part of their daily diet. That Chardonnay is tasty and easy to drink even when inexpensive does not strike me as being a bad thing much less a “mark of infamy”. It may make it a necessary target of wine snobs and self-impressed arbiters of vinous truth, but the more casual drinkers now, the more connoisseurs tomorrow, at least so it seems to me. I would argue further that there are more world-class Chardonnays being produced in California today than at any time in the past. We taste them week in and week out, and have been doing so for more than thirty-five years. Admittedly, the number of fine Napa Valley Chardonnays may not have grown appreciably in recent years -- and I wonder if McCloskey counts Carneros as part of Napa -- but the list of accomplished offerings from such districts as the Russian River Valley, the Sonoma Coast, Santa Lucia Highlands and Santa Barbara County, to name but a few, has been significantly lengthened over the last ten years. Just because the discounters and big-box stores are stacked to the rafters with $6.00 plonk, names like Ramey, De Mol, Paul Hobbs, Morgan, Freestone, Chasseur and the like have not disappeared from the market, and I cannot see that the prices of the best bottlings have gone through the floor. And, those price analyses that include data from the last couple of years must make allowances for temporal recessionary forces that have little to do with commoditization. If the relative dearth of “new luxury Napa Chardonnays” may be real, might it actually have more to do with the fact that there is simply less Chardonnay being grown on prime Napa Valley vineyards, vineyards owned by those who have figured out that Napa Valley proper is one of the finest patches of Cabernet Sauvignon dirt on the earth?

Does Cabernet need saving? Somehow, the notion that great Napa Valley Cabernet will without some sort of official classification be lost in an avalanche of cheap, nameless and faceless mass-market wines seems silly at best and cynical at its heart. That, too, is food for thought and will be revisited sometime next week.

Until then, Mr. Wark earns an “A-minus” for a provocative and recommended piece on how classification might go, even if I wish he had cast a more questioning eye the premise behind it.
http://fermentation.typepad.com

Mr. McCloskey gets a “C-minus” for positing what is likely an impossible solution to a problem that, for me, is never clearly nor convincingly shown to exist.
http://www.winesandvines.com/

Wine and Food Wednesday
Our Picks for Toasting the New Year

Wed, 29 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

At this time of the year, we are constantly asked the question of what we will be drinking on New Year’s Eve. Well, the answer is sparkling wine, but less because it is the traditional drink and more because it is simply so good with so many different foods. We talked about sparkling wine’s remarkable versatility with food a few weeks back, and there is no question that this time of year, more than any other, sees a bounty of varied dishes making their ways to our tables. The New Year’s meal is for us more often than not geared to small plates of every imaginable type; less a sit-down dinner as much as it is an evening of conversation and wandering from dish to dish with glass in hand. There are lighter, Blanc de Blancs with which to wash down the oysters and more delicate fare richer, and anything with bubbles is an ideal foil to fried tidbits ranging from tempura to pakoras to old-fashioned chicken wings. Creamy pastas and mild cheeses are welcoming partners to the brightness and cleansing acidity that are the very essence of fine sparkling wine, and, an entirely new world of wine-and-food options opens up when richer Rosés find their ways to the table.

So, just which bottles have our eye as 2011 nears? As we have sipped our ways through a good number of bubblies over that last couple of months, we have been struck by two noteworthy truths. First, the most expensive and prestigious names of them all are by no means orders of magnitude better than many of considerably more modest cost, and that, second, there are wonderful values to be found at what might best be called entry-level prices. Yes, we enjoy the likes of Dom Perignon, Roederer Cristal and Krug, but Laurent Perrier’s Grand Siècle is second to none, and the outstanding efforts from growers like Moineaux and Saves seem like out-and-out bargains by comparison. The compelling mid-priced offerings of Mumm DVX and Schramsberg deliver world-class quality and value alike, and one would be hard pressed to find better bubbly for the money than J’s Cuvee 20 and Mumm Brut Rosé. In all honesty, our list of favorites is a long one to be sure, but we would like to recommend a few recent and standouts that earn a special nod.

95 LAURENT-PERRIER Grand Siècle Brut Champagne $175.00
Long a CGCW favorite, Laurent-Perrier hits the mark once again with a wine that fully lives up to its Tête de Cuvée billing. Deep and wonderfully layered with flashes of fruit peeking through its lavish appointment of yeast and sweet cream, it is charged by a wealth of fine bubbles and is impeccably balanced as only top-flight Champagne can be. As inviting and involving as it is at the moment, it still very vital and will keep beautifully for a good many years down the line.

95 MARCEL MOINEAUX Blanc de Blancs Champagne 2004 $70.00
Very few Champagnes in our experience can top this offering for out and out value, because, even at the price, it delivers good yeasty complexity backed up by the refinement, balance and full chalky minerality that we hope to find in Blanc de Blancs. It is, by all measures, a seriously good bottle of bubbly.

96 MUMM DVX Napa Valley 2002 $55.00
Here is a wine that has one foot in California and both feet on the way to France. So intriguing is this wine that it simply has more going for it than can be found at first try. It begins with correct aromas of chalk, yeast and entirely austere yet ethereal fruit and continues on the palate with flavors that are both rich and subtle, both nuanced and keenly focused, both inviting and demanding all at the same time. No easy sipper this, its crackling acidity calls for a partnership with small oysters like Miyagi or Kumamoto in a shallot mignonette. Bring it on!! And note, one can find this wine in 1997 vintage magnum on the winery website. At $225, it is a exceptional treat.

95 J WINE COMPANY Vintage Brut In Magnum Russian River Valley 2002 $90.00
It is a well-known fact in sparkling wine circles that fermenting and aging bubbly in magnum often enhances the final product. This wine is a case in point. As good as the other J offerings are, this one is simply deeper, more polished, more ethereal than its siblings. It is also a lot of sparkling wine and needs to be reserved for very special events when there are enthusiasts aplenty in the house. And given the prices being asked for Champagne and even for California sparkling wine of the same quality, this magnum is a veritable bargain.

95 SCHRAMSBERG J. SCHRAM North Coast 2003 $100.00
Once again, Schramsberg's flagship bubbly winds up at the right end of the leaderboard. Its bold, complex blending of toast, caramel, yeast and crème brûlée takes it far beyond the realm of primary fruit, and yet, for all that the wine possesses, it succeeds because it has energetic, briskly focused fruit at its heart. With its creamy mousse of small bubbles and its rich, developed flavors in the mouth, it is a wine to serve with a first course of a fois gras crème caramel or a finely crafted lobster mousse because nothing less decadent will bring out all that is on offer here.

94 SCHRAMSBERG Brut Rosé North Coast 2007 $41.00
From its cherry pink color to its ample fruit and fine sense of vinosity, this deep and flavorful sparkler is every inch a true Rosé. It hints at cranberries and at cherries here and there and shows lots of creamy, autolyzed yeast. Its combination of solidity, scant astringency and a firm acid spine make it a wine that is a very much meant to partner foods like grilled salmon or ahi tuna, but it has plenty of richness to match up famously with refined recipes involving duck breast or pork loins as well.

93 CAMILLE SAVÈS Cuvée Rosé Champagne $60.00
A walkaway favorite in our tastings, this one smells of yeast, toast and all the bakeshop reminiscences that one expects of top Champers and adds in nuanced but evident suggestions of orange peel, Meyer lemon and strawberry. It is explosively bubbled and insistent and stays on the palate forever. This one competes well with the big names.

93 J WINE COMPANY Brut Rosé Russian River Valley $35.00
As expected from sparkling wines from J, this bright, briskly balanced bottling shows a real sense of refinement and grace from its fruity, mildly cranberry-like nose to its delicately bubbled palate. It comes with a nice complement of yeast and intimates tart cherries from beginning to end, and, if not so weighty as classic rosés can be, it is never so light than it cannot do fine service with foods ranging from grilled salmon to crispy chicken.

92 GLORIA FERRER Sonoma Brut in Magnum Sonoma County $38.00
Once again, the larger format proves to be a real boon as this involving effort shows far more richness and reach than its smaller-sized mate. Its intense, creamy, bake-shop aromas literally leap from the glass, and its layered, wonderfully well-integrated flavors of Meyer lemon, vanilla, yeast and freshly toasted bread exhibit a striking sense of depth. It is frothy and flush with abundant, very fine bubbles, and it offers up nothing short of outstanding value.

91 SCHRAMSBERG Blanc de Blancs Brut North Coast 2007 $36.00
2007, it seems, was a quite good year for Schramsberg, and this brisk, almost austere Blanc de Blancs joins the winery's Blanc de Noirs and Rosé in winning very high marks. It is less a stand-alone quaffer and more a taut, acid-edged wine that wants for food, and, while we see it as a fine choice for washing down sundry light seafoods, we expect that it will show at its most brilliant when served alongside fresh oysters on the half shell.

91 MUMM Brut Prestige in Magnum Napa Valley $50.00
It has become clear to us over the years that some special magic seems to happen when fine sparkling wine is fermented in magnum, and when compared to its 750 ml Brut counterpart, Mumm's big bottle proves the point. Rich in well-defined yeast with lots of small bubbles and a long, very crisp, mineral-laced finish, it displays plenty of classic champenized character and will prove to be a fine choice when the occasion calls for more than one bottle of bubbly.

91 MUMM Brut Rosé Napa Valley $22.00
We have long been fans of Mumm's Napa Valley Blanc de Noirs and Rosés and found them to be quintessential expressions of gregarious and outgoing California fruit, and so again is this an irrepressibly fruity working even while showing a full range of yeasty, autolyzed richness that lifts it into slightly more serious realms. Its strong theme of strawberries is overlain by a bit of vanilla, brioche and sweet cream, and its frothy mousse never quits. It is not so vinous as some Rosés, shows not so much of a hint of astringency and can be successfully quaffed on its own or teamed with a wide range of foods.

89 J WINE COMPANY Brut Cuvée 20 Russian River Valley $22.00
Yeasty, chalky lemony and crisp, all in the manner of J wines if a touch shy on full-blown champenization, this wine comes with a fair complement of medium-sized bubbles and sets its slight edge of palatal sweetness alongside energetic fruit that drifts into lemon and lightly vanilla-tinged notes. Try it alongside oriental flavored bites like rumaki or pork buns.

Connoisseurs' Guide subscribers can access our complete database of Sparkling Wine and Champagne reviews, as well as our Best Buys, articles, and other features.

Tuesday Tributes
Sorting Out The Bubblies

Tue, 28 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

A couple of very pleasant folks were driving me around on Friday, and as wine was our common denominator, you can imagine that we had a lively chat as we flitted around the Bay. The most intriguing and enlightening discussion came straight out of left field. I never saw it coming because it started with the most innocent of questions, "What wine would you suggest that I take to our family gathering on Sunday?"

That question may have innocence at its heart but it is never innocent in the answering--at least, not for me. What is being served? How wine knowledgeable is the crowd? How much do you want to spend?

Well, once we sorted that all out, we were left with "educated, wine-liking, Asian food with each family contributing a series of small dishes meant as tastes" - Oh and $25-30 would be a good bottle price.

MY conclusions were the following--and they will not surprise you. High in acidity with a touch of residual and very confident flavors. Riesling, Gewurztraminer and sparkling wine dominate the choices, and after rattling off lists to my audience of two, I pronounced myself as having come up with the two best choices--all because a Safeway ad a few days earlier had caught my eye. On offer was the marvelous J Vineyards Cuvee 20 Brut Sparkling Wine for $17. And that was how I sent a couple of nice folks on their ways Friday.

89 J VINEYARDS Brut Cuvée 20 Sparkling Wine Russian River Valley $22.00
Yeasty, chalky lemony and crisp, all in the manner of J wines if a touch shy on full-blown champenization, this wine comes with a fair complement of medium-sized bubbles and sets its slight edge of palatal sweetness alongside energetic fruit that drifts into lemon and lightly vanilla-tinged notes. Try it alongside Asian flavored bites like rumaki or pork buns.

Happy Holidays from CGCW!

Sat, 25 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Dear Readers--

We'd like to extend our fondest wishes for happiness, health, and good tidings.

Happy Holidays from all of us at Connoisseurs' Guide to California Wine.

The Connoisseurs' Wine Blog will return on Tuesday.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Oxbow Public Market

Fri, 24 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

by Stephen Eliot

Downtown Napa has been undergoing a much ballyhooed cultural revolution of sorts over the last couple of years, and, while the makeover has moved in fits and starts, there are signs aplenty that the face of the city is finding permanent change. The Copia Center for food, wine and the arts is gone, and a fair number of new storefronts are still looking for tenants as the economy remains less than robust, but a good number important new restaurants and culinary attractions now dot the cityscape, and Napa has in and of itself become a destination not merely somewhere to pass through on the way to wine country proper.

One of the more significant stops, and one that we make on a routine basis ourselves, is the Oxbow Public Market on First Street. Oxbow is a complex of restaurants and culinary shops that has seen shaky times since its opening in 2007, but is now fully occupied and at looks to be on solid grounds. Bay area residents familiar with the collection of like-minded eateries and purveyors in San Francisco’s Ferry Building on the Embarcadero will not miss the similarities, and, like the former, the place offers a wide range of temptations to the culinary inclined. Oxbow Wine and Oxbow Cheese Merchant head up a list of must-visit speciality merchants housed within the market’s main hall. Five Dot Ranch and Kanaloa Fish Market respectively offer natural beef and environmentally responsible seafoods of the exceptionally high quality, while Three Twins Ice Cream, The Olive Press, Tillerman Tea and Ritual Coffee Roasters are of themselves each worth a stop. And, on the west side of the market, The Fatted Calf is an altogether remarkable charcuterie and butcher shop that earns our highest recommendation.

If feeling at all puckish while shopping, there are more than a few on-site purveyors of tasty, not-too-expensive bites, and we rarely stop by without slurping down a few oysters at Hog Island Oyster Company. C Casa offers up a range of innovative tacos, and Gott’s Roadside on the corner can be counted on for one of the best burgers around. And, it looks like upscale fine dining will arrive soon as just last week, it was announced that Chef Todd Humphries and Richard Miyashiro formerly of St. Helena’s Martini House are joining the Oxbow family and will be opening a new restaurant sometime in the near future.

Of further note yet, there are special events and entertainment on an ongoing basis, from Friday Night Music to special wine tastings such as Oxbow Wine Merchant’s Holiday Bubbles event on December 30 to Food Truck Friday wherein Oxbow teams with Dim Sum Charlie’s to bring food trucks from throughout the Bay area to offer roadside dining from 5:00 pm until midnight on the first Friday of each month.

Yes, there is no question but that Napa is no longer just a place to get gas on the way north, and whether on your way to the vineyards or on your way home, the Oxbow Public Market is a stop not to be missed.

http://www.oxbowpublicmarket.com/

Thursday Thorns
Got Certification?

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A couple of weeks back, I ran across a story in Harper’s Wine and Spirit Trade Review that addressed a topic that floats in and out of my thoughts a fair bit these days, that of the real value to found in wine credentials. While the article draws no conclusion and takes no position, it does at least bring light to what I believe is a significant debate. Formal wine credentials such as the Master of Wine (MW) and Certification by the Wine and Spirit Education Trust (WSET) have for a good many years been important to the English wine trade, and have of late been joined by a lengthy and ever-growing roster of other “official” certifications here in the United States offered by one agency or another. I often wonder just who certifies the certifiers as I have encountered more than a few degree-bearing “experts” whose knowledge and appreciation for the subject were marginal at best, but that is a topic for another time. The one specially raised by the article was how vital such qualification might be to those in the trade, and by extension to those that blog about wine, and there is widely diverging opinion on both counts. Some argue that formal training too often leads to an inflated sense of self-worth on the part of the degree holders that results in a disconnect with “real” people. Not an uncommon circumstance, I would agree, but wine snobs in and out of the trade have been around long before the current avalanche of accrediting agencies. But, I also find accord with the notion that a bit of informed knowledge would be a welcome addition to what I read on line. There is some well-defined territory at stake in all of this as the classes, courses, degrees and certificates do not come for free, and the laws of competitive business are bound to make themselves known.

It’s a topic to which we will most assuredly be returning, and, while the Harpers article goes nowhere near far enough in exploring the issues and thus earns a grade of Incomplete, I am pleased at the questions it raises. They most likely will prove all but impossible to really resolve, but the debate and discussion they engender may well be the answers themselves.

http://www.harpers.co.uk/news/news-headlines/9803-analysis-how-vital-is-a-wine-qualification.html

Wine and Food Wednesday
In Appreciation of Port

Wed, 22 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I grew up on the beaches of Southern California, an Orange County kid of the sixties. I went to graduate school at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and, three days into the first winter, I knew without question that I would soon die. Well, I clearly did not, and discovered during my first Great Lake’s Christmas two important things. First, I was made of slightly sterner stuff than I first thought, and, secondly and much more importantly, that the discovery of real Vintage Port made all the shivering more than worthwhile. It was in the dead of that bone-chilling winter that I discovered the joys of true Vintage Port, and I still reminisce every holiday season about my miniscule flat and that very first bottle. It was a 1963 Fonseca as I recall; not expensive back then, and it wasn’t close to being ready, but it was quite unlike anything that this novice had ever encountered. Beginning that day, it has been a personal tradition to pull out an old Port on Christmas Eve…and reflect on all the years since. It is, for me, the consummate winter wine.

We tend to eat lighter on the day before Christmas and save the weighty stuff for the next day, but while Christmas-Eve dinner may not be heavy, I cannot imagine ending it without my late-evening bottle and the right cheese as a partner. A perfectly ripe Stilton, and December is the prime time by the way, is, has been and will remain a classic that has an uncanny affinity to Port, as do most every blue-veined variants from Rouqefort to Gorgonzola. The rich, relatively firm cheeses of Britain are also among my top picks. Cheshire, Double Gloucester, Wensleydale and a fine Farmhouse Cheddar all will make splendid partners to Vintage Port, and an accompanying handful of toasted walnuts will not be unwelcome. A recent favorite and the one that is at the very top of this year’s shopping list is the Fiscalini Farmstead Bandage-Wrapped Cheddar made by master cheesemaker, Mariano Gonzalez in Modesto, California. The Bandage-Wrapped Cheddar won “Best Extra Mature Traditional Cheddar” in the World at the 2007 World Cheese Awards in London, and, well, if the English know anything, they know Cheddar and Port.

The news today is that London is bracing for sub-zero weather and Heathrow is backed up as the mercury hits twenty below. I have no doubt that those in my long-ago home of Ann Arbor are feeling the chill as well. I wish them and all of our readers the very best for the holidays, and I will raise a glass on this Christmas Eve in thanks to you all. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good Port.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Brooklyn Wine Guy

Tue, 21 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken
http://brooklynguyloveswine.blogspot.com/

I have wanted to give a shout out to this blog for the longest time, and I have been waiting for him to say something, anything, about the existence of California. By his own count, he has written about Burgundy some 120 times, about Oregon 36 times and about California virtually not at all. In one sense, at least, that kind of close-mindedness ought to disqualify him from further consideration. He does not understand, has not tried to understand and chooses to ignore the very wines that we gather around the electronic fireplace to read about.

Still, I like reading his blog because he treats wine as a beverage that is to be used with food, and he is forever lingering over his chosen bottles and his food pairings. It is a kind of winewriting of the type that speaks to the joys of wine, not the scores of wine. Good for him, Mr. Brooklyn Wine Guy.

Give his site a look. I loved his discussion of veal cheeks, those oh-tender, melt-in-your-mouth morsels. He can get them at his local supermarket. I wish we could. They remain a specialty item around here.

A Selection of Pinot Noir Best Buys

As the number of fine California Pinot seemingly grows with each vintage, so too does the availability of good values. The CHASSEUR Sonoma Coast 2008 ($40.00) is a very rich, abundantly fruity effort that exhibits excellent structure and potential for growth, and the succulent, carefully crafted, 90-point MOLNAR Poseidon’s Vineyard Carneros 2008 ($30.00) similarly shows off a full measure of keen varietal fruit. The BEAULIEU Carneros 2008 ($17.00) is a eminently drinkable Pinot with plenty of straightforward appeal, and, both the supple CASTLE ROCK Carneros 2008 ($14.00) and the flavorful HAHN Monterey 2008 ($12.00) hit the mark for inviting value even if not quite earning full recommendation.

Monday Manifestos
If I Were King

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I was making a list of wine-related things I want for Christmas and realized that I was never going to get them unless I were King. Sure, someone will give me another bottle of fancy Cabernet from a producer that is new to the scene, and someone will find a rare bottle from some little know appellation in northern Italy or southern Spain or India. But, I am not talking about wine or books or paraphernalia. I am going to be receiving those items without asking for them. No, I am talking about game-changers. I am talking about new ideas and changes to old ideas and a kinder, gentler wine world in which more and more very good wine could be produced because, as King, I would have decreed the following:

There would be more Napa Valley Zinfandel. I like Zinfandel, and I even like Zinfandel that many think of as over the top. I don’t like prunes and sugar in my Zinfandel, but if it has balance, fruit, depth and Zin varietal character, I like it. And, I find that I like Napa Valley Zinfandel quite a bit. But wineries and growers in the Napa Valley are not planting Zinfandel. Instead they are adding to the totals of Cabernet Sauvignon and its related varieties. If I were King, I would decree that Zinfandel remain in Napa because it produces such lovely, refined, almost claret-like wines.
There would be more Chardonnay grown in coastal adjacent locations like Freestone. The cold areas very near the coast of California can produce wines with Chablisienne acids and minerality. True, we do not have the same soils and the wines will not taste the same. But, these are bright, deep, brisk wines, often with lower alcohols, and if I were King, there would more of them.
There would be more Riesling in the world. Need I say more? Here is a grape that produces some of the best wines in the world. There used to be 10,000 acres of the grape standing in California. Now there is closer to 2,000. Riesling is making a comeback. If I were King, I would speed up the process.
People would stop bitching about California wines being overripe, overoaked and low in acidity. They can be, but they generally are not. Yet, we hear this cant from people who should know better. All that is balanced in this wine world of ours is not from Europe or New Zealand. If I were King, people would know better.
And speaking of knowing better, people who celebrate the higher acidity approaches of wineries like Donkey and Goat, Arnot-Roberts, Wind Gap and their ilk would have to sit in a wine history class. Those wines, as welcome as they are, are not a new creation, are not “California wine rethought”. If I were King, I would show them wines from Nalle, Ridge, Marimar, Morgan and dozens of others that have followed that style for years, even decades.
There would be more and better Grenache grown in California. When Grenache finds a happy place to grow, it can have a texture close to that of Pinot Noir and fruit that is deep and inviting. It can make great wine on its own, and its role as a partner to Syrah, Petite Sirah and in field blends would be as important here as it is in other places in the world.
If I were King, the overly broad AVAs like Napa Valley and Russian River Valley would be redefined to reflect commonality of growing conditions. Today, both cover areas that go far beyond any geographic or climatic definitions of commonality or of land mass. The beauty of small-area appellations is that they can celebrate the distinctiveness of those areas. Under current definitions, we are losing out on specificity.
If I were King, the Paso Robles AVA would finally get the subdividing that it deserves. Here is a large mass that runs from cool to overheated and flatlands to hills. Yet, there are no subdivisions within that large mass. It is time for the good folks down there to realize that the wines from unique areas like westside hills deserve their own identities.
The Dungeness Crab season would last all year. I have plenty of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Riesling to drink. If I were King, I would have fresh cracked crab always around to encourage me to open more white wine.
If I were King, I would order the French to relax. The laws governing what can be grown where and under what circumstances are so hide bound that growers cannot make the best wine possible. Instead of listening to the past, it is time to look to the future.
Old-vine Grenache Rosé from the Navarra region of Spain (near Pamplona) would get the recognition is deserves. I am not a Rosé drinker, and even as King I would not be, but I do like the best of the Rosés from Navarra where old-vine Grenache yields a wine of such intensity that it begs for a year or two of age and a bit winemaking intervention to bring out its complexity. As King, I want more Navarra Rosé.
Wine drinkers in Iowa would stop describing every white wine as “Chardonnay”.
Argentinean winemakers would find a white grape that succeeds that way Malbec has done for them. Despite their best efforts, Torrontes is not going to be that grape. Even a King has to wonder whether Argentina would even be on our wine radars if it were not for Malbec. The wineries there are no different from wineries everywhere in the world. They are trying to extend their place in the world. If I were King, they would find a white grape that would be a partner to Malbec.
The “Anything But Chardonnay” club would grow up. Chardonnay makes wonderful wine. It’s popularity has been earned in good vineyards by good winemakers. Just because it is popular is no reason to diss it. If I were King . . . . . . .no, wait. Less Chardonnay for the ABCers means more for me.
If I were King, the loyal band of Connoisseurs’ Guide readers who have allowed me to taste wine for a living over the past three decades would have a wonderful, healthy, prosperous New Year. Your corks would seal tight and have no TCA. Your cellar would multiply. Your trips to wine country would be frequent and rewarding. You would be able to get reservations at the French Laundry. Yes, 2011 would be a great vintage for you all.

Sunday Serendipity
Book Review: The Ultimate Wine Companion

Sun, 19 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Kevin Zraly has very likely been responsible for educating as many people in the ways of wine as any person in America. His seminal work The Windows on the World Complete Wine Course, first published in 1985 and updated last year, is the world’s best-selling wine book and remains as good a fundamental primer of the topic as can be found. New to the shelves, his new and noteworthy volume The Ultimate Wine Companion carries the rather ambitious subtitle of The Complete Guide to Understanding Wine by the World’s Foremost Wine Authorities. While neither it nor any work could be so complete as to make all others irrelevant, it is an irrepressibly readable collection of articles from many of the more important wine-writers that have ever picked up a pen…or turned on a computer. The book is divided into six parts covering topics ranging from tasting, to wine-making, to food and wine pairing, and, much to my delight, allows nearly as much space to covering New World wines as it does those of Europe.

Since my barely remembered university days, I have been a bit skeptical about edited collections of the writings of others, and felt that such works were all too often easy ways to get your name on a hard cover. In this case, however, I must admit to both admiration and appreciation for Kevin’s insightful and ever relevant eye. Contributions range from the “old masters” to the new voices of the Twenty-First Century. Some of the pieces are from a distant past, but they still ring amazingly true. I was recently chatting about the book with a younger, very smart, professional colleague of mine and was nearly stuck dumb when I was asked who Frank Schoonmaker, Alexis Lichine and Alexis Bespaloff were, the writings of whom are included. I can recall wearing out a copy of Schoonmaker’s Encyclopedia of Wine and a couple of Bespaloff’s Signet Book of Wine way back when. I am a bit of a historian at heart and believe that the past always informs the future, and I am pleased to see their names put forward again. Truth is timeless. Zraly’s further picks of the bunch include such significant names such as Robert Parker Jr., Jancis Robinson and Hugh Johnson, and there are plenty of contemporary voices as well, with Evan Goldstein, Kermit Lynch and Joseph Bastianich but a few of those getting attention.

I cannot claim to agree with every viewpoint and conclusion of the more than forty articles contained therein, but there is real food for thought to be found on most every page, and more than a few show the craft of fine writing. In some ways, the book is as much about writing, about the clear explication and thought and unbridled passion for the subject as it about the subject itself, and I cannot imagine that any who would call themselves devotees of the topic will find it other than a sheer joy to read.

The Ultimate Wine Companion: The Complete Guide to Understanding Wine By The World’s Foremost Wine Authorities. Edited by Kevin Zraly $24.95
Sterling Epicure, New York, 2010.

Satisfying Saturdays: Eating Well in Wine Country
Picán: A Little Bit of New Orleans in Oakland

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

89 Picán 2295 Broadway at 23rd Street Oakland, California
http://www.picanrestaurant.com

It was on a dark and stormy night, with the wind howling, the rain blowing in every direction and our umbrellas turned inside out by the storm, we ventured into the new Oakland and found New Orleans. Hustling out of the climate’s hurly-burly, we opened the doors of a gray-marble clad office building and found ourselves in the midst of a happening scene. What at first looked like a Friday night bar crowd, turned out to be a collection of serious dinners, hot jazz and a one of the best stocked Bourbon bars in the Bay Area. I can’t tell you that no one beats its 140 separate bottlings of finely crafted whiskey, but I was impressed and that takes some doing, because my personal bourbon stash is not too shabby on its own.

The story of Pican starts seven decades ago when workers flooded out of the south to build warships at the Kaiser facilites in the San Francisco’s East Bay. The war ended, the workers found less employment than they needed and the slums of the East Bay, from Oakland to Richmond, and including West Berkeley, were born. Of course, Oakland’s problems probably stretch further back than that. As Gertrude Stein once famously wrote of Oakland, “There’s no there there”. Of course, Ms. Stein may not have appreciated cool jazz and soul food, the reasons why I would wander over to Oakland during my graduate school days, but, Ms. Stein was pretty much right then and she would not be totally wrong even today.

But with great effort now stretching over several decades, things have changed. We have written in these pages of urban wineries with large national reputations like Rosenblum, JC Cellars, Rockwall and Dashe and we have, in a previous rendition of “Satisfying Saturdays” recommended the Bay Wolf Restaurant, a superb dining outpost of several decades standing. And now, there is a genuine “Uptown” restaurant scene in Oakland with all kinds of delights. People have dubbed this the “new Oakland”, and to the credit of the city fathers who set about to change a moribund commercial district, the new Oakland is succeeding.

Pican, an integral part of the Uptown scene, is a vibrant, gorgeously created space with modern touches at every stop and yet a feeling of home. Given that it is a restaurant with 160 seats, you might not think it possible, but owner Michael LeBlanc, the genius behind Brothers Brewing, has brought the New Orleans touch with him and installed it at Pican. It took but a few seconds to realize that all of the hustle and bustle, the buzzing conversations, the tinkling piano were not a mass of confusion but part of a joyous celebration. There are two rooms at Pican, a bar/lounge with its own menu of southern treats, but also able to choose from the dinner menu, and a dining room for those, like the Olkens, who would prefer traditional seating and a more formal menu.

If we had not had to wait for our table, a sign of success that our 8:30 reservation was the second or even third turn of our table, we would not have joined in the rhythm of the lounge. But, there we were, waiting patiently, surprisingly finding old friends around the room, loving the modern takes on the lively hot jazz of New Orleans, when Michael LeBlanc walked up and took us under his wing. “May I offer you a one of our famous Mint Juleps while you wait?” It became clear then and there that this was a restaurant with a personality. The staff may be stretched by the crowd, but it never stops smiling, always seems to be there when you want someone and long before your food arrives, you realize that this amazingly diverse and cosmopolitan sea of faces is all smiling, has all been gathered up and that Pican is in charge. You have been delivered to Bourbon Street and you never even left home.

I wish I could tell you that this food was every bit as interesting as the experience itself, but that would be too much to ask for a restaurant whose menu is down home, not Chez Panisse. Our first courses were a bit of a mixed bag. Crawfish and Mushroom Ètouffèe was the most delightful new dish of the year for me. Perfectly cooked pieces of crawfish come served in a tasty sauce with mushrooms, scallions and rice. It was New Orleans in a bowl, and while some found its spices at bit too hot for their taste, to mine it was exactly as I would have expected. That was New Orleans food after all, and it had not been dumbed down for the quiche-eating crowd. The Ètouffèe and a piece of Pican’s excellent cornbread will make a perfect lunch on my next visit.

Unfortunately, a potentially interesting version of Chicken and Dumplings went astray when the Chicken Livers were undercooked. While we could taste the possibilities for this dish when the all the bits on the plate were combined in one mouthful, the dish simply was not executed to perfection. On the other hand, the PIcan Magnolia Salad turned out to be exactly as advertised with its bits of pickled persimmon lifting the perfectly dressed lettuces and toasted pecans. Here is where California met New Orleans head on and the marriage took.

Our main courses started with the restaurant’s highly regarded Southern Fried Chicken, and if ever you want to know what a perfectly cooked piece of that dish tastes like, Pican is the place for you. The folks who ordered it loved it, and the order was so large that there were leftovers. Owner LeBlanc popped up again at that point with instructions for reheating in order to preserve the amazingly moist chicken and the crisp outer shell. The side dish of smoked gouda “mac n’ cheese” had one of our crowd eating every morsel so quickly that Mr. LeBlanc, on one of his many passes through the restaurant, and how does an owner manage to be everywhere all night long in a place with 160 seats, asked if there was something wrong with the chicken since it was sitting untouched as the mac n’ cheese disappeared. The dish turned out to be too smoky for another of our diners, but it is advertised as being made with smoked cheese and the rest of us loved it. Score another hit for Pican.

Two other mains of the “Low and Slow Pork Ribs” and the Laquered Duck were also wonderfully tasty. The ribs were not like any pork ribs in my experience. These were large and meaty, and they were obviously cooked “low and slow” because the meat simply fell off the bone. It was a little bit disconcerting at first to have pork ribs with the fall-apart consistency of a well-made beef short rib, but the molasses barbecue sauce quickly brought the flavors in perfect focus. Even though Mrs. Olken thoughtfully slid one of the ribs onto my plate, there were still two left at the end of the night. It is dark and rainy day here today, and those ribs are going to be part of lunch.

I will admit that I finished my duck. I order duck out more often than anything else, and this was as most and flavorful as any I can remember. It was a bit of “in your face” with its sweet sauce and its sweetened “sauerkraut” (in reality, a form of pickled cabbage served as a sauté) but the assembled Johnny cakes on the plate absorbed some of the excess. So, a bit of mixed messages. Brilliantly cooked duck, most tasty and satisfying, but a touch of refinement went missing in this blending of California and New Orleans.

There is no question that I am going back to Pican. I can already taste my next bowl of Crawfish Ètouffèe, and there are several starters that we simply did not get to and appeal to my tastebuds including Mr. LeBlanc’s favorite, his Fried Green Tomatoes, and also the smoked pork belly and the shrimp and grits.

On the way out, we stopped by the table of our friends we had spotted on as we came in. Lev Dagan, teaches wine appreciation at the California Culinary Academy along with my associate at CGCW, Steve Eliot. Lev, with whom we have dined at various occasions and share very similar food and wine tastes, said that he had been to Pican several times and that he tends to try the small plates because he can get a wider variety of tastes that way. I think he is right in a way, but I have to also try the smoked brisket meatloaf and the catfish with andouille and dirty grits on the mains.

Pican is a treat for the eyes, the ears and the palate. Its wine list could be better, but we brought our own, the new Williams Selyem Litton Estate Pinot Noir and it fit perfectly with our chosen food. Corkage is $25, but worth it if you bring a strong California Pinot Noir which will be my choice again for the rich, long-cooked dishes at Pican.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Special Day in Wine Country: Schramsberg Vineyards

Fri, 17 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I am the official Olken Family and college connection tour guide to California wine country. It goes with the territory, I suppose, just as I am the Chez Olken sommelier, cellar master and anointed cork puller. I have a few friends and family who are very deeply into wine appreciation, but most of the time, I go off to the wine country on day trips with visiting firemen who want nothing more than a good view, an inexpensive taste of good wine and a nice luncheon.

But once in a while, I have the luxury of touring with folks like my collegiate buddy who heads a home winemaking group in Boston or my roommate from Ontario who drinks Petite Sirah and likes it or the couples with whom we hang out the most and who actually know a thing or two about wine. Wine country visits with those folks are more serious, indeed, almost studious events because the people come with knowledge and want to learn more. And I want to take them to places where they can learn while tasting very good wine.

This series on wine country destinations entitled Friday Getaway Day has mostly focused on accessible wineries that pour lots of wine, are relatively inexpensive and have pleasant tasting rooms and amenities such as views or artwork or both. Today, I want to point you in the direction of a winery that is certainly an attractive place, indeed, most wineries are these days, but which specializes in high quality wines and whose visits are by appointment only and are limited to small numbers at each tour. It may cost a little extra, but for those who want a deeper experience, it is worth it.

There are, of course, many such places, but few win as many high ratings in Connoisseurs’ Guide as Schramsberg Vineyards. Set in the hills above the Napa Valley and just about on the cusp between Spring Mountain and Diamond Mountain, Schramsberg is sparkling wine country first and foremost. Those famous wines that have served at occasions of State for many Presidents were grown on site for years, but lately the wines come from grapes in cooler locations and now a very good Cabernet Sauvignon is grown in the home vineyards. And it is that change to grapes from Carneros, Marin County, the Anderson Valley and their coastal ilk that has allowed Schramsberg to rise from good U. S. producer to world-class producer.

And the best way to learn in depth about Schramsberg is to visit, to tour the caves and to taste with the staff. This is not a tasting room visit. This is a winery visit. And it is a visit that promises to teach even as you are tasting some of the finest sparkling wine around.

Schramsberg Vineyards
1400 Schramsberg Rd.
Calistoga, CA 94515
(707) 942-6668
www.schramsberg.com

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Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
In My Dreams

Thu, 16 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Twas the week before Christmas and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even Charlie and his Logitech mouse.
The blog sat there waiting, all snug in its lair
While the author, old Charlie, was asleep in his chair.
With dreams of what could be running wild in his head,
The author awoke and now posts them here to be read.

And that, dear readers, is how today’s blog was born. Instead of trundling off to bed as my dear wife so politely suggested, I have decided to share one of my fondest dreams about what could change for the better in the wine world. In a perfect world, the existing system of small-area appellations in this country, called American Viticultural Areas (AVAs) would be scrapped and boundaries for such legally recognized entries would be redrawn according to commonality of probable wine outcome.

Put simply, any system that goes beyond the use of States and Counties as geographic names on labels should have meaning that can be understood as something more than squiggles on a map. Commonality of climate, exposure and soil type lead to limits on the likely range of outcomes. People plant Chardonnay in the coldest areas of western Sonoma County because the influences there make Chardonnay one of the good choices. People plant Zinfandel in hotter patches nearby because it can succeed there. Yet, western Sonoma County, not far from the Pacific Ocean and those Zinfandel-loving places in protected areas near Healdsburg are totally different even though they can both go under the name Russian River Valley. And there is the now illogical overlap that was allowed when the uplands Chalk Hill area, good for Cabernet Sauvignon, was also allowed to use the Russian River Valley name.

The American Viticultural Area system of geographic designations for wine growing areas is now some thirty years old and came about at a time when notions of terroir were simply less important than they are today. As the result, this very useful system, which we here at CGCW applaud for being a big step forward, is now out of date. Growers and wineries were allowed to use old designations even though some of those designations were then and are today substantially inaccurate as a system of linking like areas under a common name. The Napa Valley name is one of the most hallowed in all of the wine world and yet there are vines in Napa County that are so far removed from the area we think of when we think Napa Valley that the untrained eye might think they were in another county. The vines themselves act like they are. The wine labeling rules do not.

The Paso Robles AVA and so many others join Napa Valley and the Russian River Valley in being misleading and do not help us understand the nature of the wines they cover even though that was the goal of the AVA system in the first place. The likelihood that these exaggerations, because that is what they are, are going to change is virtually zero, and we are not going to beat ourselves up trying to get them to change, but, dear readers, it has been the CGCW position from the first time we testified before the Government brains who were considering the establishment of a more accurate appellation system, that the geographic designations should have meaning as to wine style. Even an appellation like Rutherford is too broad because it is a town-wide designation from one side of the valley floor to the other. Every year, the wineries in Rutherford sponsor a tasting of their mostly fabulous wines and they themselves group the wines by east, west and mid-valley because the wines differ by location. Why, then, should the AVA system not recognize the West Rutherford Bench, for example, as being unique? The folks who planted the Valley both before and after Prohibition understood that proposition. Should our wine labeling regulations not also be as smart?

Perhaps this rant should have been saved for one of our Monday Manifestos. It certainly does not qualify as a Report Card on “those other guys”, but it does lead to this.

Grade for Poetry: C-, and apologies to Steve Heimoff whose good poetry on his blog yesterday has led me astray.

Grade for the AVA system: A-, morphing now to C+ because it is rapidly becoming out of date as the industry’s growing understanding of the limits of geography increasingly influences planting decisions.

Grade for this rant: B-/C+, with positives for being an accurate portrayal of a somewhat flawed system, but subtractions for spending time on an issue that is not close to amenable to change in today’s world.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Let The Experts Speak
~~But Not Too Loudly

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Last week, Wine Spectator columnist Matt Kramer checked in with an interesting article entitled “Free at Last! Free at Last!” wherein he blasted the latter-day view and practice of food-and-wine pairing as being overly fussy, patently intimidating and largely the fault of the French. A “miserable matter” he claims, and, to some extent, I must admit that find myself in fair agreement. The notion that a good wine will go very well with many foods is a maxim to embrace, and, as long as a bit of common sense is employed (no oysters and Syrah for me, thank you very much), there is an astonishing range of possibilities for pleasure when a fine bottle comes to the table.

The world has become both larger and smaller than it was but a generation or two back, and by that I mean that there is an extraordinary number of fine wines and fascinating foods to be had from all points on the globe, and they are available in most every market. And, as Mr. Kramer points out, but for the caution that the extreme examples of either are likely to make for more limited pairing options, the path to pleasure is a broad one indeed.

At the close of his piece, Kramer takes an unkind swipe at those writers and sommeliers whose “elaborate pairings and rationales” are seen as means to enslave an insecure public and to thus justify their own existence. Hmm, here’s where it gets a little uncomfortable. It too often comes down to this, as we read Kramer, the public needs and wants saving from self-impressed “experts”. It is a repetitive and tiresome call that leads too easily to the idea that everyone should be their own expert—a populist rallying cry to tear down the walls of the elite.

I am and have been for a good many years been a student of food and wine, and I for one do not believe for a minute that I know it all. I am always willing to listen to what a sommelier has to say and read whatever a wine-pairing writer might pen, and I still take enormous delight in learning something new. When I go to a fine restaurant, it is not about calories, it is about entertainment and involving myself in the art that speaks to me most. I could choose to ignore what a sommelier has to tell me in the faith that observing a few basic rules will avoid a wine and food clash, but that hardly ensures those epiphanal, my-god-this-is-good moments that are what I secretly seek. The good sommelier who listens rather than tells, the one that knows his or menu as well as the cellar, and a writer that has acquired a broad base of knowledge seem assets that are a shame to waste.

Now, I do not believe Mr. Kramer meant that we should throw all food and wine pairing advice out the window and that all sommeliers and writers should be summarily dismissed, but I feel the need to offer at least a small voice for their appreciation. I expect that good writers and sommeliers have and will survive because of a simple free market lesson. If what they say makes sense to enough people enough of the time, then they will be heard. If not, well, they will and should be out of business. Experience teaches, and experienced teachers are worth listening to. Most folks are capable of sorting through advice and opinion and finding their own particular truth without the need of “saving”. That’s what wine and food advice is. It is simply advice.

You can find Mr. Kramer's article at http://www.winespectator.com/webfeature/show/id/44178.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Mike Dunne Looks At Calaveras County

Tue, 14 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Mike Dunne is a wine columnist for the Sacramento Bee, one of the newspapers of record here in California. His columns and blog do not get enough attention because he rarely focuses on those popular spots far away from his home town. Yet, Mike Dunne is a serious and well-informed wine journalist, and his latest blog has me thinking that it is time to head east.

Calaveras County is well-known to me. I used to wander up there in my dating days with whomever I was lucky enough to be hanging around with at the time. But it was not for the wine. It was for the Jumping Frog Contest—an event meant to build on the famous Mark Twain essay, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”. Oh, I have returned once or twice recently, and by recently, I mean over the last twenty or thirty years, but it must not have been all that recently because Dunne’s comments about his recent visitation tell me that I don’t really know as much about Calaveras County as I should.

I do know this. There are only about 600 acres of grapes, two-thirds of which are red and the greater portion of those grapes are Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon. The only Calaveras County wines tasted by Connoisseurs’ Guide in the last half dozen years have scored relatively poorly with a few Good Values but nothing out of the ordinary. Until now. Even though it has no tasting room and makes it wines in the Bay Area at JC Cellars, Oakland, the Prospect 772 label has raised expectations high for Rhône-type varietals grown in Calaveras. That winery represents, if the today’s Best of The Blogs entry is correct, just the tip of the iceberg. All of a sudden, Calaveras County has been discovered and, as Mike Dunne reports, the number of wineries has doubled in the last couple years.

His blog, A Year In Wine, www.ayearinwine.blogspot.com, comes a lot closer to traditional wine journalism than most blogs, and as such, it is a far more relaxed and informative kind of writing. It focuses mostly on the wineries nearer to Sacramento, but it also visits other good topics. Today’s essay on Calaveras County earns our Best of The Blogs honors this week.

Monday Manifestos
It’s Not Bias! It’s Common Sense!

Mon, 13 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I would be the wrong person to tell anyone not to spend their money on fancy wine. I have a cellar full of intriguing bottles from all over the world. We have a kitchen full of gadgets that neither Mrs. Olken nor I need or use—and I am about to run out to Williams-Sonoma and buy her some new toys. I should have bought a Prius, but I didn’t. No, I am the wrong person to preach the gospel of frugality.

And yet, I just cannot help myself—and I am going to make a few Francophiles upset in the process. I came home late Sunday afternoon from a very successful day in the hazy sun at Candlestick Park watching the hometown bullies play decent football for a change. I can’t imagine why since they haven’t performed up to snuff all year. Still, I came home happy as can be and settled into my overstuffed family-room chair to give a careful perusal to the printed news of the day. Yes, I know, the printed news is yesterday’s news, but I am a “print” guy after all and I am not about to cancel my daily newspaper-—not as long as I am a print journalist. It would simply be bad karma.

The Sunday rag came wrapped in an advertisement from the local grocery store, and I was in the process of discarding it when its back page caught my eye. There, in plain sight, was a full page of wine bottles and price tags and savings offers. Put in its simplest terms, a man in my profession does not ignore such things. So, there I was looking over claims about being ready to sell me some fancy wine for big discounts when I spotted the irresistible—the prices on an array of the bubbly.

And here is the kicker. There were wines in this advertisement that represent some of the greatest bargains of the season. Imagine getting Mumm Brut Prestige for $12 when Mumm Cordon Rouge in all its not very exciting Frenchness sells for three times that amount. Imagine an advertisement for Veuve non-vintage Brut, another acceptable but patently “unspecial” wine at almost $40 when the far better Roederer Estate Brut or the J Cuvée 20 are on offer at $17. Why pay $40-50 for most non-vintage Champers and up to $70 to $80 for vintage-dated Champagnes when their qualitative equivalents cost under $20.

And so, dear friends, while I have no wish to deter you from spending large amounts for the best grower Champagnes, for the killer California bottlings from DVX and J. Schram or for the hard-to-be-better-than triple digit French tête du cuvée bottlings like Roederer Cristal, Perrier-Jouet Fleur de Champagne and Laurent-Perrier Grand Siecle, I must also urge you to take advantage of the steal of the year.

The top California bubblies in every price category simply outpoint and outvalue their French counterparts. Don’t settle for lesser wine at higher prices. This is the year to buy California bubblies by the boxload. It is not bias talking here. It is common sense.

Sunday Serendipity
Wine Label Contest Winners

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Earlier this afternoon, I was looking through a just-arrived book from the Spanish firm of Gonzalez-Byass celebrating that family’s 175th Anniversary in the wine business, and I was particular engaged by some of the old, elegant and often aristocratic labels. I remember thinking, “I want that one” or “that one is pretty chintzy” with its gold medals filling every nook and cranny not reserved for the name of the wine itself. But, no matter whether created with timeless understated elegance or with the pastiche of the day, the labels were a joy to examine.

Today’s blog, however, is not looking backward for inspiration. Today, we celebrate the best in new label design. And like the old labels of Gonzalez-Byass and the pictures of Uncle Pepe, after whom the world famous sherry, Tio Pepe, is named, today’s labels run the gamut from the elegant to the ultra-modern, from understated beauty to “look at me now” energy. There is no great unifying theme to these labels other than that they are a delight to the eye and add a special luster to the bottles they adorn.

The old adage, drink wine not labels, is a truism not to be ignored. But, I will tell you an Olken family secret. We also drink labels from time to time. We like pretty things, and when a handsome label announces a fine wine, we are delighted to put that bottle on the table. Makers of sparkling wine both in Champagne and here understand that equation, which is why their bottles of expensive bubbly are often the most handsomely crafted you will find.

The labels that have emerged from this year’s International Wine Label Design Contest, sponsored by The Volunteer Center of Napa Valley, range from wonderfully professional to whimsical. The winners fall in the following categories: Successful Innovation, Dramatic Graphics, Classic Style and Labels Not In Production. The overall winner, Le Poisson Gris, by Ana Rosales of New York for an African wine, came tops in the both of the Innovation and Drama categories. The Nine Hats label won for Classic Design and is my personal favorite. It has an elegance that will transcend time.

The roster of international judges was headed by the ever-energetic Paul Wagner, co-author of the widely used book, Wine Marketing & Sales, wine marketing instructor at Napa Valley College and head of the international wine consulting agency, Balzac Communications. Wagner comments that “There is no question that labels play a critical role in wine marketing, and this competition brings attention to those who are really good at it. The winning labels were fun, dramatic, creative, and most of all, effective!” A team of international wine marketing experts formed the judging panel.

A call for entries for the next competition will go out in spring of 2011. The proceeds of the competition, which are in the form of submission fees, go directly to benefit the Volunteer Center of Napa Valley. Over the past year, the center has provided an estimated $500,000 in volunteer labor to benefit local non-profit organizations.

Satisfying Saturdays
The Hottest New Restaurant in Healdsburg

Sat, 11 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

90 SCOPA RESTAURANT 109 Plaza St Ste A, Healdsburg, CA (707) 433-5282 www.scopahealdsburg.com GOOD VALUE

By Charles Olken

Took a quick trip up to Healdsburg, accompanied by my better half, for a book signing event at the Sonoma County Wine Library, a must stop for any wine information seeker. Spoke to the enthusiastic assembled crowd, along with Chris Hanni of the Hanna Winery and Ana Michelle Jordon of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat. We each have new books. Theirs being about cooking and mine being the many times mentioned (pardon my immodesty) New Connoisseurs’ Guidebook to California Wines and Wineries.

The evening festivities ended at 9:00 PM, and despite its reputation as a tourist mecca, Healdsburg had pretty much shut down by that time and our dining options were severely limited. Our local friends, Ron and Kathleen Washam, met us for dinner afterwards and Ron, whom some of you will know as the former blogger also known as The Hosemaster of Wine, suggested we try a new place to us by the name of Scopa. “It’s a pretty good little Italian restaurant” was all Ron told us. And since we were hungry, and several other choices had already folded their tents for the night, we wound up at Scopa.

Did I tell you that Healdsburg is pretty dead at that time of night? We drove over to the restaurant on the north edge of the Healdsburg Plaza and discovered that Scopa had thankfully replaced one of few poorly run Thai restaurants in our experience. Walking in at 9:30, coming off the deserted streets, you get two immediate surprises. The place was packed to the gills with only our reserved table sitting open, and the crowd was having a ball because the place was noisy. It is a slim, long room with tables running along both walls back to a bar at which several folks were also eating. I mentioned to the wonderfully attentive waitress that it was surprise to find so many people there so late on a rainy Thursday night and she said that this was a slow night. Wow!

Now popularity does not necessarily translate into good food, but at Scopa it did. And it did so at a price so low that we had to pinch ourselves to make sure you are still in wine country--$60 for two, corkage, tax and tip included.

The menu, while not overly fussy, is several steps ahead of your local pasta joint. The top end dishes do not try to compete with fancy places like Perbacco, Acquerello or Bottega, but every item we tried would fit into the antipasti and pasta dishes at those much adored, and three times as expensive establishments.

Our group started with shared appetizers, and I heartily recommend that you follow that pathway to a serious of wonderful two and three bite flavors. Grilled calamari came drizzled with oil and vinegar and was served on a bed of savory beans. Arancini, deep fried risotto balls, were served with a deep dish of homemade tomato sauce. And, as good as those dishes were, the star of the first courses for me was the Chanterelle Budino, a custard round into which Chanterelles had been liberally inserted and served with pickled leeks. I could go back for the Budino alone.

Our mains were a mix of light and heavy. The ladies happily settled for soup and a salad with goat cheese while the hungrier of us had pasta—a lovely version of pasta carbonara, the creamy-sauced wide-noodle dish with prosciutto throughout, and here helped by non-traditional sautéed onions. We once at in Rome at a restaurant called Carbonara, and this version was better than that often-recommended dish. And the pasta with a long-cooked pork ragu, lightly seasoned with tomato and pepper flakes left the two guys scrapping of the last bits.

I will admit that the Olkens don’t go to wine country for pasta. We are looking for treats like Syrah in Santa Rosa, Cyrus in Healdsburg, The French Laundry and it's somewhat easier to get into compatriots in the Napa Valley. But, folks, Scopa is different. It would be a hit in any location you can imagine, including Italy itself.

Scopa Restaurant
109 Plaza St Ste A
Healdsburg, CA
(707) 433-5282
www.scopahealdsburg.com

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Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
St. George Spirits

Fri, 10 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I have long thought that those who ferment, brew and distill at the artisan level were among the more passionate and fascinating folk that I know. The best of them might be described as “crazy smart” whose remarkable art is born equally of meticulous craftsmanship and a compulsive need to play outside the lines, and, a recent afternoon with our friends over at St. Georges Spirits in Alameda made me more comfortable yet in my beliefs. We dropped by to witness the birth of the latest Firelit Coffee Liqueur and watched, glass in hand, as distiller Dave Smith began a cold brew of 300 pounds of specially selected aged Mocha Java from Weaver Coffee that will soon be distilled with Chardonnay brandy into the third incarnation of what is without question the finest coffee liqueur ever made.

Now, Firelit is only one of a host of remarkable small-batch spirits made by remarkable people at St. George, and, if asked to come up with a motto for the place, I might lobby for “Hmmm, I wonder if I can distill that?” They say of themselves “we can’t write like Neruda, paint like Cézanne, or dance like Jennifer Beals, but we can express ourselves through distillation. It’s our art form, our passion, and our way of making the world just a little more beautiful. It’s not that we have a short attention span. We just love distilling.” Well, we love what they do and are glad that they do it. Some crazy poets shake their fists at the sky, some, it turns out, make magical spirits.

St. George Spirits was founded in 1982 and has, since 2004, called a hangar in the old Alameda Naval Air Station home. They are open to the public for tours, tastings and emotional support (their words, not mine) and both the place and the people make St. George Spirits a must visit for any who harbor even a glimmer of interest in high-proof art. They welcome guests Wednesday through Saturday from noon to 7:00 PM each day and Sunday from noon until 5:00. The tasting room affords a terrific view of the San Francisco skyline, and they offer a variety of tasting options that run the gamut from their extraordinary Aqua Perfecta Eau-de-Vies to flavored Vodkas, a Single Malt Whiskey, Qi Tea Liqueur and Absinthe. In addition, they will provide privates “classes” in Cocktail Education for larger groups, and, if you ask very nicely, they will host after-hours cocktail parties for up to 75 people. And, if you so choose, they will keep you informed via e-mail of special events and new releases.

If you have not been, it is time to go…and if you have, well, you never know what their band of mad-scientist distillers (their words, not mine) might have new up their sleeves. Give them a call at (510) 864-0635, and you can read their defense at http://www.stgeorgespirits.com/.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Joe Roberts (1WineDude.com) Talks About Balance

Thu, 09 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I tend to like days when life is simple—like this one. I hit the computer about eight o’clock and checked my email and my favorite websites, both news and blogs, got a bit of writing in and then knocked for my usual morning chow. On tasting days, I am busy getting ready for that great pleasure and on non-tasting days, of which today was one, I have no set schedule and tend to alternate between writing, visiting wineries, going to ballgames on days when there are Wednesday day games, watching the occasional European soccer match, especially those featuring Manchester United, Barcelona and Real Madrid.

Today’s readings gave me the perfect topic for THE REPORT CARD, but instead of writing that entry, I left for the day and spent the afternoon at St. George Spirits, which is conveniently just down the road a few miles from me in Alameda over on the old Alameda Naval Air Station, immediately next door to Kent Rosenbloom’s new venture, Rockwall Winery. Today, St. George was brewing up a batch of its increasingly popular Coffee Liqueur called Firelit. I am not a coffee person, but Steve Eliot, CGCW’s Associate Editor is, and you can read his discussion of an earlier batch of Firelit under the Sunday listings for our blog.

Well, it's now bedtime and I have blog to write. I am wide awake, because even though I am not a coffee person, I tasted an entire line of experimental coffee liqueur batches today, and it turns out that they have a lots of caffeine. I think I like the advice seen in the “Press” section of the Firelit website, “good enough to drink for breakfast”. Next time, I will.

Earlier today, I was perusing the usual suspects among the blogs and came across Joe Roberts/1WineDude thoughtful essay about “balance” in wine. With all that has been written about this subject in the last couple of weeks, it was refreshing to see that Joe treated the subject as directly and rationally as he does virtually all upon which he comments. Joe is a winelover, not a wine geek. He likes all kinds of wine and likes wine to taste good. He has no formulas in his head for what is right or wrong. You won’t find Joe spouting off about TA (total acidity) or pH (pH—sorry, don’t know what it stands for) or ABV (alcohol by volume—or as CGCW calls it “alcohol”). Joe talks about how wine tastes and how it moves him.

His response to this topic is perfect for his style and his audience, and because his audience has wine pros as well as consumers, he was rewarded with a fairly extensive and wide ranging group of comments. The full article and the comments are worth reading. www.1winedude.com .

GRADE: A-/B+, but only because Joe was not trying to be profound, just honest and with no axe to grind.

I need to take up a little more of your time with an entry from today’s comments over on 1WineDude. Tim Hanni, was the first American to earn the coveted MW (Master of Wine diploma) along with our friend and former tasting panel member, Joel Butler. Earning an MW is no easy feat, and it is even harder for Americans because the MW program is run out of Britain and thus focuses almost not at all on American wines.

Lately Mr. Hanni has been researching the numbers of tastebuds on individual palates in an attempt to define what kinds of wines people with different amounts of tastebuds will like. It's fascinating stuff, and it is certainly true that each person has his or her own unique tasting acumen. I would argue that tastebuds are but one part of the equation. Experience, interest, even the chemistry of our mouths (some people have higher or lower pHs to their saliva. Some have more or less saliva. A great taster like Joel Butler, Tim’s comrade in MWism, professes to be less than adept at smelling TCA and the other anisoles that add musty notes to wine. My tasting compadre, Steve Eliot, is the first to detect low levels of volatile acidity in wine. Jeff Cohn and Matt Smith, the winemakers most often sitting in our CGCW blind tastings, can often tell not only the provenance of the oak in the wine but also, at times, the maker.

So, today, over on Joe Roberts’ site, Mr. Hanni, brought his “number of taste buds” theory to bear on why some people never like California wine (they have thousands of tastebuds), on why some people like California wine when they first encounter it but then shift their preferences away over time (these are people with multiple hundreds of tastebuds) and why some people continue to like California wine even though they have been exposed to it for years (those with almost no tastebuds by comparison to those other groups).

Needless to say, this is utter bunk. And I am forced to say so despite my admiration of friend Hanni. To put it another way, apparently 95% of people living in California are born with an insufficient number of taste buds and we just do not know any better. We have been born with the palatal equivalence of color blindness and tone deafness. And it is somehow a unique California affliction because we do tend to like California wine. Of course, the Aussies might also have it, but no one has told us that yet.

This theory gets what it deserves: F

Wine and Food Wednesday
What to Serve With A Bold Syrah-Petite Sirah

Wed, 08 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

As mentioned earlier this week, we had the genuine pleasure of attending a tasting and luncheon at Shafer Vineyards in Napa Valley’s Stag’s Leap District last Friday, the focal point of which was a complete vertical of the winery’s Syrah-based (with 20% Petite Sirah) Relentless offerings dating back to 1999. We will address the wine findings in the near future, but it is lunch itself and how the wines showed with food that is the topic of today’s ramblings. This morning, Chef Michael Weller, one of my close friends and colleagues on the California Culinary Academy faculty, who incidentally with his wife just happens to be a huge fan of Relentless, asked me with a touch of friendly envy in his voice, just what the folks at Shafer chose to serve with eleven vintages of Relentless. My answer set me to thinking.

Now, those familiar with the wine know it to be a big, broad-shouldered, immensely powerful, tannin-rich bottling that makes no apologies about being very ripe. Given its stripe, I had rather expected something equally big and bold, say hearty braised short ribs, slowly cooked lamb shanks swimming in sauce or, perhaps, a classic garlic-larded, rosemary-infused leg of lamb roast. A no-brainer, I thought, whatever would be on the menu would surely be on the extreme end of things as far as flavor and seasonings went. That, however, was not the case. The menu consisted of simply prepared, medium-rare rack of lamb paired with roasted winter vegetables. No heavy sauces, no potent spices, no blaring garlic, just succulent, perfectly cooked ribs of lamb that, when brought from the kitchen, left me wondering if they might not be overpowered by the wines we had just tasted.

The lamb, if one relied on the wisdom of the elders, would have seemed better suited to Pinot Noir, a polished Cabernet or a rounded Merlot, I thought, but Relentless? Well, the meal was, in a word, marvelous, and it was moreover an object lesson in the virtues of balance. Yes, Relentless is a wine or real muscle and size, but it is also one of structure and balance as well. Its alcohol is not modest, but it is never unduly hot or given to cough-syrup viscosity, and, for all of its pepper and spice and undisguised tannin, it never wavers in its expression of very deep, well-defined fruit. The older vintages whose angles and edges are beginning to soften and smooth were especially comfortable partners to the lamb, but even those still-sinewy younger wines did not overdo it and, in fact, were not even close to being too much of a good thing.

Lunch turned out to be an entirely serendipitous and timely reminder that ripeness alone does not necessarily define any wine, and, that even when speaking in a commanding and confident voice as Relentless most surely does, balanced wines can and will surprise at the table.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
HACKING A WINE—From Reign of Terroir

Tue, 07 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Blogs come in all shapes and forms. They can be short and pithy. They can be long and full of interesting stories. They can challenge the common knowledge. They can often be quite ordinary (hey, no one who writes every day is going to get it right every time). And they can be so damn smart that you have to read them twice to grasp all the information presented in them.

One blog that qualifies every time as “smart” in Reign of Terroir, http://reignofterroir.com/, written by Ken Payton. Sometimes, Kens’ offerings are “too smart”. I don’t get what he is talking about, or if I do, the topic is so out in left field that it is for wine geeks only. More than any other blog I read, I go back to Ken’s work multiple times because, if nothing else, he has me thinking, learning, questioning my own sense of common knowledge.

Just such a posting is his recent entry entitled, “Hac(king) A Wine” in which he proposes to change the name we attach to a serious of spoilage mechanisms whose deleterious effect on wine is to leave it with a musty, damp cellar smell. Payton wants us to abandon the words “Corky” or “Corked” for the broader meaning attached to HAC.

True to his style, Payton has written a very long and involved essay on the subject. I don’t agree with it all—as I will explain below—but my disagreement is, in fact, simply a different way of looking at the effects of a bad cork. Put as simply as possible, when CGCW encounters a wine in our tastings that carries an unmistakably musty character, we remove that bottle and put a new one back into a later tasting. If the problem is the cork, then typically it is an isolated bottle problem, but if the second bottle is musty, especially if the character is somewhat different from the classic “corkiness”, and it is consistent with the first bottle, then chances are we have not another bad bottle but a contaminated batch of wine. Rather than employ a fancy monicker that relates to a chemical family, we simply describe it as musty. This much can be agreed upon. Without retasting, the source of the problem may be the cork, most often is in our experience, but there is no way to know until a second bottle is opened blind.

This may all be a little bit too technical for a pleasant read on a winter’s day, but if you are interested, then do go to REIGN OF TERROIR and dig in.

Monday Manifestos
Names, Give Us the Names!

Mon, 06 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

The high-alcohol debate regarding California wines is not only unlikely to abate anytime soon, it seems to be intensifying of late, and, as it was the topic of several CGCW postings last week, so again is it the focus of today’s rant. Anyone who checks in on our site is aware of our thoughts on the issue, and we will not go into a lengthy restatement and defense of our positions that 1) balance, not arbitrary alcohol limits, is the key to real vinous success; that 2) there are now and have been many hundreds of exquisite California wines over the years that do not fit the overripe, overblown, over-oaked model that is by too many being painted as the immutable norm for wines of the state these days; and, that 3) those winemakers who do, in fact, seek optimal ripeness and balance are far from being the enlightened vanguard of rethinking and will part the dark sea of California plonk while leading us to a bright, new promised land.

Rather, as I am increasingly curious at just what wines and wineries are the actual offenders that have led to so much ideological huffing and puffing. I would ask today of those true believers, give me names. Just who are the perverters of the winemaker’s art? In truth, the widening gulf between those that do and do not enjoy California wines, at least publicly, is not solely the result of heinous alcohol levels but all sorts of “unnatural” tricks and tweaks and manipulations of what is supposed to be a “natural” and “authentic” product. For examples, we hear of those who remove alcohol from their wines and then add it back later, and of ill-conceived practices of micro-oxygenation, cultured yeast fermentation and acid additions that are the devil’s work at the least. Who are they? Do not tell me that they exist, point them out and share what insights you may have.

The topic came up again a couple of days back during a wine-writer’s lunch hosted by Shafer Vineyards following a fascinating retrospective tasting of the winery’s proprietary Relentless bottlings that will be the basis of a special report in the days ahead. Now, Shafer will never be accused of making delicate wines, but it is hard to argue with the fact that they convey remarkable richness and complexity and have aged very well. After working our ways through 11 vintages of Shafer’s powerhouse blend of Syrah and Petite Sirah, casual conversation perforce led to the alcohol debate, and the question came up that the high-proof “fruit bomb” bashers never seemed to point out just who the offenders might be. They are never named, but inevitably a handful of exceptions are cited as having seen the light, and the rest by omission seem to be the villains.

That makes for a very big “rest” by the way, so big that wholesale condemnation of the California wine culture is implied, and that is why I want names. Without them, I am left with the uncomfortable sense that you believe some vast conspiracy of uncertain motive, although toadying to certain critics seems the villains’ usual character flaw. Do not just tell me who you like, tell me where the offenses lie, unless you mean to tell me that there are only a handful of producers (invariably tiny) that might be worth my time. If you prefer leaner, lighter, more subtle wines, I have no issue, and, in a given mealtime context, I am likely to agree. But, if those wines that are worthy can only be described with reference to what they are not, if their descriptions come with formulaic swipes at wines of other styles, then I begin to worry. There seems lately a need to be “right,” a need for vinous truth and true enlightenment, and, as a simple corollary, if there is a “right,” there must be a “wrong.” Saying that a wine is delicious and talking of its virtues, it seems, is no longer enough, but it must be seen as being “right” to have any credibility, and, when enjoying a good glass of wine, the need to be “right” is simply not on my agenda.

Sunday Serendipity
In Appreciation of the Cork Puller

Sun, 05 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

In order to appreciate the cork puller, one needs to appreciate the cork. If not, then go worship the screwcap, the glass stopper that really seals with a layer of plastic or the plastic plugs that look like corks but are, well, plastic. They too can be withdrawn from a bottle with a cork puller, but it hurts our sensitive feelings to call them corks. Cork is a natural produce. It grows as the bark of a tree. Plastic is not a natural produce, and while it could legitimately be called a “closure”, a “plug” or a “hunk of stuff”, it is not cork and thus is also not a cork.

We prefer to pull cork with our cork pullers, and while we could go on and on about the raging debate over the use of cork as the wine closure of choice, suffice it to say that cork remains our favorite closure. And in the three decades plus of pulling corks out of bottles, we have developed a very healthy, indeed, a profound respect for the cork puller as well. What we have been less than respectful of are the individual cork pullers we have employed in the process of pulling what now numbers well over 100,000 corks pulled and counting.

In the beginning, we were not very sophisticated about cork pullers. We used whatever was at hand, and most of them were odd shaped things designed more to amuse or to sell for next to nothing. If you searched around the kitchen, chances are that you would still find some of them. We soon graduated to the shape that is known as the waiter’s pick. After all, it is good enough for restaurants everywhere, it had to be good enough for us. But the trusty waiter’s pick, which is still the cork puller of choice for restaurants, has real drawbacks and ultimately, we went through a series of items from the Screwpull with its Teflon-coated, narrow and long wire (not to bad, but slow) to the Ah-So which we still use at times but is also slow. We are pretty good at not knocking the cork into the bottle with the Ah-So, which is a major drawback until you have plenty of practice. We next tried various versions of the levered cork puller of which The Rabbit is the most famous. We tired of those devices because we were wearing them out, and even before we would abandon one and go get a new one, they were slowing down and becoming difficult. Today, the manufacturer of the most expensive of them promises that they will not fall apart, but, we have moved on.

Today our favorite cork puller is the old standard, the waiters’ pick—but in an updated version that makes getting the cork out almost effortless. Today, several manufacturers make waiter’s pick with a graduated lever so that the cork can be pulled out half way with one level and then a second lower level gets rested against the bottle top, and its improved angle gets the cork out the rest of the way with little effort. These pullers are quick, efficient and have become our cork pullers of choice.

Satisfying Saturdays
Eating Well In Wine Country

Sat, 04 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

90 MANRESA 320 Village Lane (just off North Santa Cruz Avenue) Los Gatos CA 95030 408-354-4330
www.manresarestaurant.com

You may have noticed that Connoisseurs’ Guide has a hard-earned reputation for being the most demanding graders among the wine critics. And you may have also noticed that we are considerably more generous with our restaurant ratings than our nearest competition, The Guide Michelin which is as stingy with its stars as a priest running out of holy water.

Yet here we have a very fine restaurant that simply disappointed us. It earns a rare two-stars from the Guide Michelin, and there are only two at three-stars and three at two-stars according to that august body. We would award a lot more. But, not to Manresa. The reason is simple: inconsistency. We have dishes at Manresa that are world-class heavenly like the fois gras crème caramel and the Arpege egg. We have had dishes that fell flat on their faces like the Bavette Steak cooked in its own suet. Greasy, gross, heavy and, frankly, the absolutely wrong way to end a meal that lasts four hours.

So, yes, we are a bit bothered by Manresa. We went there with my son and his special friend, a professional chef and graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park. NY. We were showing off, and the restaurant let us down. Not overwhelmingly, mind you, but enough so that Mrs. Olken is not interested in going back. She and I have a simple standard for expensive meals out: serve me dishes better than I can make at home. Much of the food at Manresa did that, but not all. And at the price, it all should. It does at Cyrus and The French Laundry. It does at every fancy, multiple-star meal we have ever had in France, save one, and it should have at Manresa. A score of 90-points is not a bad rating, of course, but the restaurant should have done better.

Friday Getaway Day:
Wine Country Destinations

Fri, 03 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have a couple of road trips coming up in the near future, and I always consider them to be one of the nicest parts of my job. Wine country is a nice place in which to hang out. The mix of natural beauty, good wine and well-prepared food is inviting, and because those visits are not formal tastings of the type that engage most of our time here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, these are the relaxing times despite the fact that they are also work.

Today, for instance, I am on the road to the Napa Valley. I can’t begin to count the number of times I have made this journey, and yet I love the drive up Interstate 80 across the Sacramento River and then into wine country. I have changed my route in the last several years as the area around Vallejo has become increasingly urbanized. Now I stay on I-80 to the Red Top road exit and then connect to Jamison Canyon Road taking what is still a country road that is beginning to look like its own wine valley over to Highway 29 just south of Napa town. It may be a few miles longer if you are a crow, but it is prettier and less congested.

I am headed this day to Shafer Vineyards in the Stags Leap District. With all the debate about so-called “high-alcohol wines” and the sneering attitude with which too many people use that term, it turns out that Shafer is one of the wineries whose offerings I haul out as proof that wines over 14%, and typically nearer 15% can be balanced, free of excessive heat and work well with food. And it is my contention that wines like those crafted by Shafer have very admirable longevity as well. This trip is occasioned by the opportunity to taste a Shafer’s Syrah, called Relentless, back to 1999. There are no older versions of the wine, so I won’t be able to judge how they have held up for two decades, but wines that are ten years old have begun to give themselves away. They tell you by their depth, vitality, structure and complexity if they are aging well or not, and they allow you to form reasonable expectations of their futures.

We know that ripe Napa Valley Cabernets hold up in bottle for two decades and more. When the concentrated 1970 era Napa wines bested the French in the famous Paris tasting of 1976, it was said that the results reflected the early maturity of the California wines and that the results would be absolutely turned on their head two decades later. Well, it is now forty years since the birth of the California 1970s and the Bordeaux 1970s, and the best of California wines are still hanging in their nicely—easily the match for their French cousins. But, we don’t yet have a full body of evidence for Syrah. Indeed, we do not yet have an agreed upon notion whether ripe and extracted Syrahs will age better than wines made from cooler climes. This tasting of Shafer Relentless Syrahs is going to give us clues that will be irrefutable. I can’t wait. And we will offer a Special Report on those wines next week right here in the blog.

Next week brings another road trip, this one to Healdsburg to speak at the Annual Book event at the Sonoma County Wine Library. Three authors with new books will be on hand to share our views of the state of the industry and to talk about how our books came about. I would welcome any and all who are in the area to come by. I will be happy to sign a book for you. The event runs from 7 PM to 9 PM on Thursday, December 9th. You all come.

The Sonoma County Wine Library, http://www.sonomalibrary.org/wine/, is located at the corner of Piper and Center streets in downtown Healdsburg. Healdsburg in itself is a great wine destination whose array of excellent restaurants would put many big cities to shame, and while I won’t have time for a long sit-down meal at Cyrus, one of the Olkens’ absolute favorite restaurants in wine country anywhere, I do plan to visit Jeff Mall’s Zin restaurant where everything that can possibly be done on the spot is, right down to the ketchup.

Thursday Thorns:
The Report Card

Thu, 02 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It feels like it has been a full week of blogging already, and all because our Monday blog paralleled Steve Heimoff’s blog and in turn was picked up by John Kelly’s Winemaker’s Blog. By the time, the dust has settled on the debates about alcohol levels and new paradigms, the scrum involved several writers hurling question marks and epithets at each other and other writers rushing to the defense of each other on both sides of the issue. People from all over the wineloving spectrum jumped in, but fortunately, there was more light than heat shed. No conclusions were reached, but we all had our say, and, you can read the Connoisseurs’ Guide position in our Monday Blog, in the many comments I have inserted on Steve Heimoff.com since Monday and over on John Kelly’s Winemaker’s Blog.

Here are the links:

http://cgcw.com/databaseshowitem.aspx?id=77447
http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2010/11/29/truth-lies-and-alcohol-in-california-wine/
http://www.winemakernotesblog.com/

And, if you want more, here is a link to an article in San Francisco Magazine, by the very competent young winewriter, Jordan Mackay. In this instance, I disagree with Jordan for the all reasons you will find at any and all of the CGCW, Steve Heimoff, John Kelly blog links above.

http://www.sanfranmag.com/story/the-fruit-bomb-resistance

Here are the grades for all of these participants.

Jordan Mackay, for writing an article purporting to educate and instead winds up proselytizing on the one hand and insulting most California wines and the people who like them on the other. GRADE: C-

Steve Heimoff, for having the willingness to use his very popular blog to confront the misdirection inherent in the San Francisco Magazine article. GRADE: A

CGCW, for consistently saying that wine is to be judged one bottle at time and not by some artificial construct, but failing to tie the argument to the people who have brought us to this point. GRADE B

John Kelly, for pulling no punches in disputing the article with winemaking fact, but then pulling a punch or two when he went over to Heimoff’s blog. If you want Mr. Kelly at full roar, go to his blog. GRADE: A-

Charlie Olken, for finding a fuller, richer, more complex voice on the Heimoff and Kelly blogs. GRADE: A-

Insider comment: Steve Eliot commented to me, after seeing my blog, “you really got wound up”. I wish I had been so wound up as I got later into the debate.

And now for something different.

ALL THE NEWS THAT’S FIT TO SPIT

HEART RESTAURANT San Francisco
The sardonicly cast blog, Louisville Juice, has alerted me to a San Francisco restaurant into which I will never step foot. No matter whether they can cook or not, this place is too full of itself. On the one hand, it says that it is committed to serving good wine in the simplest possible presentations free of the silliness that it accuses other restaurants of practicing—like stemware. This place, HEART by name, serves wine in Mason jars. OK, I get it, but these are not any Mason jars. These are fancy, imported Italian Mason jars.

Well, I was sort of thinking that they deserve a pass until I read the menu and the wine list. The menu boasts, literally brags, screams “local produce” right down to the Marin County this and the California that, etc, including listing the name of the local provider of the sausages and salumi. Nice touch of braggadocio, that. Then, why is it that this locavore has not one wine on its list from the United States. Come to think of it, now I understand why the wine jars have to come from Italy. Our wines and wine jars are not good enough. Lord save me from phonies like this. GRADE: D.

A GOOD EDUCATION IS HARD TO FIND

Consider the following two items that appeared in Tuesday’s wine news.

1. AGRICULTURE COLLEGE CONSIDERS CUTS
Morphing 13 academic departments into eight, cutting 25 percent of administrative faculty and potentially shrinking south campus farm operations were major concerns for College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Michigan State, or CANR, students meeting with CANR Dean Jeff Armstrong on Monday night.

2. DEAN A FINALIST FOR CALIFORNIA UNIVERSITY PRESIDENCY
Jeffrey Armstrong, dean of the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at Michigan State, is one of three finalists for the presidency of California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo.

GRADE: Incomplete, but fingers crossed that he stays at home. We are doing a pretty good job of killing off our educational institutions on our own thanks.

Wine and Food Wednesday
Pairing With Cracked Crab

Wed, 01 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Today’s column might be bettered labeled as “Food and Wine Wednesday” as it is what’s on the plate rather than what’s in the glass that gets top billing, and that would be fresh Dungeness Crab. Now, we understand local pride and regional bias and would not argue with those would name others such as Stone, King or Blue as their crabs of first choice, but, when in season, West Coast Dungeness, known to its egghead admirers as Metacarcinus Magister, is the unchallenged crustaceous apple of our eyes. That season just opened here in San Francisco and is shaping up as a bountiful year after a cyclical downturn the last several years.

It is a timeworn tradition hereabouts to serve crab during the holiday season, and the biggest and sweetest of the bunch are typically to be found from mid-November until the New Year. While there are plenty of delicious recipes and methods by which these tasty morsels can be prepared, I sometimes wonder if even the most talented chef can really improve on the perfection that is fresh, simply cracked crab, lots of drawn butter, a warm loaf of locally baked sourdough and the right bottle of wine.

Here at Connoisseurs’ Guide, it is an old and much practiced custom when tasting schedules permit to bring out big bowls of cracked crab when wrapping up Sauvignon Blanc tastings, but, in truth, this is a dish that is wonderfully wine-friendly. Barring those at the extremes, such as starkly acidic dry wines that become all too shrill and shrieky when juxtaposed with the crab’s sweetness or the heaviest, most highly ripened, oak-infused Chardonnays that render the delicacy of Dungeness all but moot, most any white wine is bound to please.

As much as I enjoy a temperate (read not rife with grapefruit, newly mown grass and feline intimations) Sauvignon Blanc with crab, my favorite accompaniment of all is a Riesling that sports but a scant edge of sweetness. Well-made Riesling reminds that delicacy and character are not mutually exclusive, and, when the crab and Riesling are both good, I am amazed at just how much of each I can work my way through. I would also rank Oregon Pinot Gris high on my list, and the lovely King Estate “Domaine” 2008 comes with a note of subliminal sweetness that makes it an altogether memorable mate to cracked crab. On other occasions, I have very much enjoyed fresh crab washed down with Albarinos from Spain’s Rias Biaxas, and most anything white and Italian will quietly get the job done. The trick, if you can even call it that, is to find a wine that refreshes with its balancing acidity yet does not overpower what is an inherently flavorful yet delicate dish…and, with that simple thought in mind, common sense is what informs most.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
What’s In A Wine Score

Tue, 30 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Seen in: Notes From The Winemaker, a blog

By Charles Olken

There are very few topics in the winewriting world that get visited more often, generate more heat and produce less light than the endless analysis of wine scoring. I confess to having contributed more than my share of wisdom to those discussions. I have a particular point of view places the words about wine at the pinnacle of all wine criticism and views stars, puff, stars, points, chopsticks, badges and any and all rating systems as nothing more than notational shorthand for the words that must, of needs, accompany any rating. No words of value equals no rating of value in my view of the world.

It all seems so simple to me. Words describe and evaluate, assess, examine and explain the findings. Points, stars, cookies and checkmarks do not. Cannot. Are useless in and of themselves. And I have argued this point time and time until I get tired of hearing myself. That is why I finally stopped arguing it at all. People either understand and accept the purpose of rating systems or they do not. There are rational reasons why rating systems work, and there are rational reasons why they have distinct limitations. There is no new ground to walked in this discussion.

Until now. John Kelly is the winemaker at Westwood Winery, and he is also, to my thinking, a very sound wine philosopher. He thinks about broad topics intelligently, and he examines them and explains them not in buzzwords or quick sound bites or with unbridled bias for one position to another. He is a philosopher, yes, but he is also a student, a scientist, a man of few words, and yet, when he does unburden himself, his words are worth hearing.

I recommend his comments and the debate which follow over on his blog, http://www.winemakernotesblog.com/.

Note well: This is a serious discussion among people who are very serious and also very respectful even as they probe each other’s logic and agree and disagree. There is no light reading in the blog. If they were, I would have left it in a heartbeat. I have very little space for the airheaded comments that try to paint rating systems into a corner. They have both positive and not positive aspects. The debate on John Kelly’s blog does a better job of examining them than almost all of the other conversations yet published.

Monday Manifestos
There Are Many Roads To Damascus

Mon, 29 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have seen the error of my ways. I have preached against food wines. I have turned my back on light, thin wines with acidity as their main virtue. I have blasphemed those who have told me that the use of ripe grapes was a sin against Bacchus. Yes, I have been of closed mind and blocked palate. I have enjoyed wines over 14% in alcohol. I have found fruit and balance, beauty and sheer drinking pleasure in Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. I have anointed my eyes with oak juice. I have poked fun at sommeliers whose wine lists seek out wines no one has ever heard of because of their claim that California wines do not go with food.

But, now. Now. Now, dear readers, I have seen the error of my ways. How could I have blindly followed wineries like Paul Hobbs and Dehlinger, Staglin and Shafer into the vinous Nirvana? Why have I not loved Gruner Veltliner and embraced Albarino as the saviors of my taste buds? How could Kuleto be accepted in my house with its India Ink Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine whose very name should stand as a warning that it is loaded with oak and tannin and named after darkness? And, much to my very embarrassment, I have held these views, worshiped those big, rich, tasty wines like the 1970 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons against the advice of the “informed”, and never mind that those Napa wines live on whilst their fancy French counterparts have fallen apart.

My dreams have shown me the way. I have awoken to a new reality. I have had a Damascus-like conversion. I have given up my evil ways.

And then I really did awake, and it was all just a bad experience born of too much acidity, too much green wine, too many bottles that really did not go with the Cal-Med, tasty, fresh ingredients that feature on the menus of the restaurants that I like best. It was a bad night that went away with the light of day. I was truth that trumped loud ideology. There are many roads to Damascus, but unlike the conversion of Paul of Tarsus, my road to Damascus leads back to California.

It turns out that I have been right all along. I drink wine because it goes with food, and I am not afraid of wines with character because I eat foods with character. I am not afraid of acidity, but I am not a slave to it. I am not afraid of richness because a salmon filet that is grilled in black skillet with shallots and butter deserves a wine that has the moxie to stand up to it, and a standing rib roast does not want a thin, acidy red wine. It can be happy with a wine that has aged twenty years into a softer, rounder version of itself, but it can also go perfectly well with a Dehlinger Pinot Noir or a Staglin Cabernet Sauvignon. And despite the claims that wines like Shafer Hillside will not age because they are ripe and open under their tannins and have alcohol levels in excess of 14%, I have the proof that they will in the findings of a twenty-five year vertical tasting that proved otherwise.

And, once again, I denounce the false prophets who see only one way to make wine and who now claim that there is, for the first time, a few wineries in California smart enough to make balanced wines—by which they mean wines created in their narrow image of what it right and why California is wrong. The facts are that California wineries make very good wines in many styles and have for years. The facts are that Schramsberg sparkling wine has been and will remain every bit as bracing as its counterparts from Champagne despite San Francisco restaurants who will stock no California bubblies and assert that none of them have the right balance. The facts are that Dutton Goldfield and Marimar and Bjornstad and Ramey make briskly built Chardonnay and that Williams Selyem Pinot Noirs may be ripe but they are also balanced. It is the naysayers, dear readers, who need a Damascus conversion, not you and me. We will drink bitingly crisp wines when the occasion calls for those wines, and we will drink medium-bodied wines that show restraint but are not afraid of themselves and we will drink our Ramey Chardonnays and our Williams Selyem Pinot Noirs with our pastas in creamy fois gras sauces.

We have seen the light, and it has many faces. And some of them grow right here in California.

Post Script: Eric Asimov, the noted New York Times winewriter, paid a fine complement to my new book, The New Connoisseurs’ Guidebook to California Wines and Wineries, with a simple sentence proclaiming that the book, so clearly focused on what I find of value in California wine and why, was free of “boosterism”. My rant above, I admit, is not entirely free of boosterism. It is, however, free of bias. It comes from within and reflects the understandings that I bring to my work every day. California wine is to be judged bottle by bottle. It is not a rarity to find good wines that have balance, depth, precision and beauty and that come in many styles and many forms. We need not follow simplistic versions of what numbers make our wines right or wrong. We need only stick to the standards that wine should be balanced and focused, should reference the fruit from which is made and the place where it is grown and should taste good.

Sunday Serendipity
Book Review: WASHINGTON WINES and WINERIES

Sun, 28 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

WASHINGTON WINES and WINERIES by Paul Gregutt, Second Edition, 360 pages, University of California Press, Berkeley California, 2010 Price: $34.95

Four years ago, when this important book was first published, it received well-deserved critical acclaim as the definitive work focused on the wines and wineries of Washington State. This second edition is even better, not just because it has more wines and better explanations, not just because it is written by the recognized leader in Washington winewriting, but mostly because it is a very fine and complete look at the quantitative and qualitative growth of the Washington wine industry.

Every wine region needs a work like this. Until Mr. Gregutt produced his, there was not a reliable, wise, insightful book that focused on Washington. This is a masterful work. It is full of facts and guides to important data. Yet, when Mr. Gregutt goes beyond the data to introduce us to the places of importance, to the wines that are leading the way and to the producers who started the boom and to the producers who are joining in, he does more than simply educating our brains. He informs our palates. He makes the wines come alive. Yes, every region needs a book like this one, and in the new Second Edition, Paul Gregutt has made a good book even better.

Sunday Serendipity
J Vineyards and Winery Pear Liqueur

Sun, 28 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A couple of nights back when the Thanksgiving meal was done and my guests and I backed away from the table in abject surrender, I went looking through the cabinet where I hide my special tipples in search of a bottle or two that might ease our collective guilt about once again forgetting our promises to not overeat. Hiding there amongst the Cognacs, Armagnacs, old Rums and the like sat a small bottle of Pear Liqueur made by one of our favorite sparkling wine makers, Russian River Valley’s J Vineyards and Winery. When the limited production item first appeared a few years back, I remember being much impressed, but as time passed and new bottles came and went, my bottle was pushed to the back of the shelf and largely forgotten. Well, I wish all reunions were as happy as that which followed, for a little post-prandial glass of J’s liqueur was, as they say, just what the doctor ordered.

Made from a base of twice-distilled alambic pear eau de vie that was given ten years of aging in 90 gallon French oak barrels then cut with rainwater to 30% alcohol and lightly sweetened, the liqueur is neither so sugary as to be cloying nor as hot as unadulterated eau de vies are wont to be. It is a lovely, carefully crafted, after-the-meal sipper that captures the absolute essence of fresh pears with deft touches of caramel and vanilla adding notes of quiet complexity. It is altogether delicious drunk neat, but its use as a flavoring agent in sauces and mixed drinks strikes me as being limitless. The winery’s website, in fact, offers several cocktail recipes created by winery Executive Chef Mark Caldwell to show off the liqueur, and among them is an intriguing version of eggnog that is now on my list of things to do this holiday season.

A quick check on the Internet showed that it is still available both at the winery and selected retailers alike. While a bit of diligence will find it priced here and there below the winery’s listing of $40.00 for the 375 ml bottle and $70.00 for the 750ml, the winery will ship to California addresses for those unable to find it in their home markets. Either way, it is well worth the search and fills a unique and most tasty niche among fine artisan spirits.

http://www.jwine.com/Wines/Templates/List.aspx?vID=13&Specialty
http://www.jwine.com/Entertain/Recipes/other/30/

Satisfying Saturdays
Joel Palmer House

Sat, 27 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

93 Oregon’s Joel Palmer House 600 Ferry Street Dayton Oregon 97114 www.joelpalmerhouse.com By Charles Olken

If you search for good restaurants in Oregon wine country on virtually any list, from any source, using almost any criterion save cheap, you will find the Joel Palmer House coming up at the very top—not just near the top mind you—at the top. No real surprise there, this old house with its plantation columns hides a gem in its interior, but the gem is not just the comfortable country décor. It is the food that keeps me and visitors from everywhere coming back at every opportunity.

And, if you are in Portland, a city with a remarkable culinary tradition for a city its size, and you do the same search, chances are you will find the Joel Palmer house at the top of the list. So broad is this delightful restaurant’s pull that it simply transcends specific locale and is, in many learned opinions, the place to go in Oregon when distance is no object.

To say that its menu is creative is not the point, because no matter how creative it is, and frankly, there are more avant garde eateries in Portland proper, some thirty miles away, it is the love of mushrooms and truffles that separates the Joel Palmer House from virtually any other, and not just those in Oregon. On recent trip there, we started with the famous Wild Mushroom Soup and followed with the equally famous Three-Mushroom tart.

Virtually every main course features mushrooms heavily in its design whether it is the mushroom coated wild salmon or the filet with porcini or scallops with a wild mushroom duxelle or the pork and black chanterelles. Now, all this fungus might seem like a bit of a gimmick, but in this case it is a studied discipline that developed over the years. And while there are mushrooms from first to last, including the special six-course Mushroom Madness Menu, it is not the mushrooms themselves that separate the Joel Palmer house but the quality of the fresh ingredients and the incredibly good cooking. If you have any reason to be anywhere near the restaurant, you owe it to yourself to experience one of wine country’s most unique dining treats.

Joel Palmer House
600 Ferry Street
Dayton, Oregon 97114
(503) 864-2995
www.joelpalmerhouse.com

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Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
The HESS COLLECTION Winery

Fri, 26 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have had a lifetime of going into the tradesman’s entrances to wineries. I do it all the time. But, sometimes it is fun to go unannounced, on a Sunday drive or with family and friends in tow, and simply walk in the front door like the rest of the guests. When I visit wineries as part of my daily grind, it is to meet the people involved, to see the technical end of the business and to taste the wine in barrel. In short it is all business. The key for me is in choosing wineries for front door visits is that they need to be more than just tasting rooms.

I like to visit Zuchico on West Dry Creek Road because, more often than not, owner Steve Zuchico is serving the wine at the tasting bar and his winemaker is out back ready to chat with you about the new wines in barrel. Try getting a taste of a barrel sample at one of the big, luxurious tasting rooms in Napa or Sonoma. I like to visit Robert Mondavi because the tours are the best in the Napa Valley at explaining how wine is made. It does not matter that I could probably lead those tours myself. My relatives do not want to listen to me giving speeches. They want to hear winery folks telling their own stories. I like to visit La Rochelle in the Livermore Valley. It is small enough to have a personal feel and professional enough to be more than “a taste, spit and move on to the next place” experience. And the wines are very good—always one of the requirements for an “unannounced” day in the wine country. In early editions of the Friday blog, I recommended visits to Clos Pegase and to Paradise Ridge. Those wineries meet all my requirements and more because they offer not just wine and welcoming hospitality but also because they have created destinations in their own right.

The Hess Collection winery, www.hesscollection.com, is just such a place as well. The minute you click onto the website, you get the idea. The first topics are Vineyards, Wine and Art, and the winery might also have mentioned “history” and “a lovely hillside location” as added attractions. Hess Collection has it all, and that is why it rates as one of my favorite places to visit in wine country.

Its tasting options run from the easily affordable to the expensive depending on what you want to taste and whether you want to experience the available end of the line or you are looking for a wine and food pairing experience. In that, Hess is no different from many of the top visits in the Napa Valley. But what sets Hess apart is owner Donald Hess’ love affair with fine art. You see, Hess is not just a pretty face in a historical old building, set in a lovely location on Mount Veeder with good wine. Hess is also an art museum. It is a delight both to the palate and to the eye. The modern art on display is museum quality, but it has a whimsical edge that separates it from displays of the 20th century masters. You won’t find Picasso and Warhol on display here. You will find truly interesting works of art that turn a winery visit into something much more. And, that is why the Olkens and family and friends drop in on Hess unannounced. There is nothing wrong with a tradesman’s visit to Hess for the winewriter. But there is so much more to be seen when one walks in the front door.

The Hess Collection
4411 Redwood Road
Napa, CA 94558
(707) 255-1144

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Happy Thanksgiving!

Thu, 25 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Wine and Food Wednesday
Thanksgiving Thoughts

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Nope…I am not going to do it. I am not going down the same rutted road that is as gridlocked with wine writers of every stripe as the Oakland Bay Bridge is at 5:00 PM on a Friday afternoon. I am not going to offer up my own clichéd list of wine recommendations for Thanksgiving dinner. The truth is that I find the traditional American spread of Turkey and trimmings to be one of most maddening meals of the year as far as finding a really happy wine pairing goes. It is a meal that works with many wines and no wine at all. Oh sure, a rich, deeply filled Chardonnay or milder Pinot might be just dandy with the bird and even the stuffing, but then there are the sugary, marshmallow-glazed yams, the Brussel sprouts…and let’s not forget the cranberry sauce, a partner so deadly to wine that the word “malevolent” springs to mind.

When given a choice I might reach for bubbles (the pink kind) and real Beaujolais can be nice; and I do not mean the newly released nouveaus that seem to strike a chord with all who wish to be French for day. (The frenzy that attends the third Thursday in November reminds me too much of that day every March when we pretend we are Irish and are asked to drink ghastly green beer.) After many years of searching for something that I can contentedly drink throughout the Thanksgiving meal, I must confess that I have just about given up. I remember when the world was a simpler place and television commercials for Blue Nun, Lancers and Mateus were there to guide us and teach us that there were wines that worked perfectly with everything, but those days and their innocence are forever gone. And, despite the fact that a recently tasted entry for our January Zinfandel issue informed us on the back label that it made ideal drinking with “all known foods”, I have been betrayed too many times and am afraid that my faith in such promises is dead.

This year, I just might take the salad-bar approach to wine service and set every place with five or six glasses, and then fill the table with every bottle that even has a chance of being enjoyed. A bite here, a sip there…yes, it really might work. The one thing of which I am certain is how much I will enjoy the sure-to-be-needed digestif effects of a fine old Brandy after the carnage concludes. I know that this sounds too much like Thanksgiving Day at the Scrooges, but I really do love the day and look forward to the warmth of family and friends. It is a day, however, that I must put my professional wine guise aside, and, you know, maybe that is just what a holiday is for.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Louisville Juice Explains Beaujolais Nouveau

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Over in France, there is Burgundy where they grow Pinot Noir and the northern Rhône where Syrah is the red grape. In between is an area that probably once was thought to be wrong for both of those grapes so they grow something called Gamay Noir there and they call the wines Beaujolais. I know all about Beaujolais. I have been drinking it since my senior year in college when, in our rush to prove how sophisticated we were to our dates, my roommates and I moved up to $1.69 Beaujolais from $0.89 Gallo Hearty Burgundy. Of course, that was the year before I migrated to California where I soon discovered Weibel Green Hungarian and Wente Gray Riesling. That first year in California was the year before I discovered the Napa Valley, Beaulieu, Inglenook and Louis Martini and unwittingly sowed the seeds of my undoing.

But, I digress. Back to Beaujolais. At this point, it is my duty as a winewriter to explain Beaujolais to you, and because this is mid-November, I am duty bound to explain not just Beaujolais but that wonderful phenomenon, that brilliant marketing coup called Beaujolais Nouveau—or “New Beaujolais” for those who do not speak French. It is a duty that is felt not just by me, dear readers, but by winewriters and pseudo winewriters everywhere. The problem is that they get the story wrong all too often.

The upshot of this parade of misinformation is the first guide that explains to the uninitiated wine writers how to comport themselves when they come face to face to New Beaujolais. It was written by one of the most clearheaded writers we have in the wine blogosphere, and he has published his instructions where we all—you, me, a thousand bloggers can read it and get it right.

Today’s Best of Blog is found here, http://excellentproj.com/2010/11/19/how-to-write-about-beaujolais-nouveau-a-primer-for-lazy-winewriting/.

A careful reading of the URL gives away the title, but don’t let that stop you. Newspaper man Tom Johnson has a wicked sense of humor, and while you are roaming around his site, you might also check in on some of his other essays such as “Wines Robert Parker Would Rate At 50 Points”, “Best Read Wine” in which the author explores wines that go with literary passages, “Today’s Mystery” and you will have to read that one yourself. Oh, and how about “Like Riedels Wearing French Ticklers”, and I am not going there either, but you should. This is very funny stuff, and we certainly could use a good dose of that now that José has retired.

Here is how Mr. Johnson describes himself and his blog. If you do not click over to his blog after reading what comes next, there is no hope for you, I’m afraid.

From Louisville Juice/About

LouisvilleJuice.com is produced more or less entirely by Tom Johnson, with contributions here and there from people who know useful things. Tom lives and works in Louisville, Kentucky — which is not exactly the center of the wine universe, but oh well.

Tom has been a professional writer and documentary producer for longer than he cares to admit, specializing in historical, cultural and political issues. Along with dozens of general interest magazines, he has written for Vineyard & Winery Management and Palate Press. He holds an Advanced Certification from the Wine & Spirits Education Trust in London, and was the Plumpjack Fellow at the 2010 Symposium for Professional Wine Writers. He regularly conducts story-based wine tastings in and around Louisville, and is working on a book of true stories about the amazing and sometimes bewildering things people have done out of a love of wine. As readers will quickly learn, he is an ineffective proofreader.

Tom’s wine cellar would make a lousy photo feature. It’s cardboard boxes, mostly, piled in the corner of the dank basement. The boxes are filled with Chateauneuf du Pape, Rhone blends from the central California coast, off-beat Bordeaux, itty-bitty bottles of aging Sauternes, middle-class Riojas, and teenaged Barolos. He has a serious thing about Bandol and holds a smattering of velvety-good Napa Cabs left over from his travels. Italian wines are mostly a mystery to him and he’s confused by German labeling conventions. Every Summer he tells himself that he’s going to learn about Riesling, and then drinks nothing but New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.

LouisvilleJuice.com is an unprofitable enterprise. It does not accept advertisements or paid content.

Monday Manifestos
A Three Grape World

Mon, 22 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Global Zinfandel Day was celebrated last week. Food & Wine Magazine wants us to drink Syrah with our Thanksgiving meal. Beaujolais Nouveau made its annual mid-November appearance right on schedule, Gruner Veltliner arrived like gangbusters, Riesling is said to be rising, Champagne sales are growing again.

So, why do I get the sinking feeling that, at the end of the day, it is still a three-grape world? Perhaps it is the evidence. That is the problem with evidence. It tends to trump belief. It overwhelms desire. It makes moot our false hopes. It shines the harsh light of day on dreams that come in the moonlight. Yes, evidence is what matters when you get right down to it. And evidence is a bastard.

Connoisseurs’ Guide lives in a twelve-wine world. We regularly cover Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Zinfandel, Syrah, Petite Sirah, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris, Riesling, Viognier and sparkling wine. We look once a year at the limited amounts of less widely produced Rhône varietals—not so much because they are in such demand from you, our readers, as we do because we are looking for hope in a world dominated by three grapes.

Yet hope is that fickle commodity that exists in the moonlight but not in the noon-day sun. The truth is that we live in a three-grape world and all the others are just pretenders. No need to examine the viscera behind the fall of grapes not named Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Cabernet Sauvignon. No need to punish Syrah yet again for not turning out to be any more broadly successful here than it is in France. We make plenty of perfectly good, even great Syrah, but not enough. In Zinfandel, we have a grape capable of making wines that are different from the claret and Burgundian-wines at the heart of the three-grape world. Riesling is among our favorite varieties; indeed, we are not the only winewriters to make that statement. None of that changes the facts on the ground.

We can look forever for the reasons that we are now in a three grape world, and over the years, Connoisseurs’ Guide has chronicled those grapes’ rises to power, their metamorphoses, their twists and turns and their ultimate emergence at the expense of so many other worthy contenders. There is plenty of evidence to be seen. The wines are the evidence, and if one looks at our soon-to-be released lists of our top wines of 2010, it will be dominated by the three grapes. Sure they will be others that make the list, but that is just it. They will be on a list dominated by those three grapes.

But even that is not the evidence that is so concerning. We review what the wineries make. In large measure, they make what they can make well, but, overriding that optimistic view is that other evidence. It is the evidence of what it is that wine lovers buy. And no matter how much we like Riesling or how much praise we give to Grenache or Zinfandel, the evidence is that the other grapes are slowly being pushed aside wherever the world has a chance to push them aside because wine lovers first and foremost have voted with their purchasing dollars.

Will it change? Perhaps.

Must it change. Not really.

What happens if it does not change? We will lose even more of the diversity that we have lost.

Is there reason for hope? Always. Always. In a funny way, antiquated laws that keep Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon out of lands where they can be grown successfully and the small but determined push by some old-line vintners to experiment with their own locally grown varieties, including some that had all but disappeared years ago, will keep hope alive because it will keep diversity alive. The real question is whether any of those other grapes in going to break through. If not, they will always be the others—the Vouvrays and Savenierres made from Chenin Blanc, the Albarinos of Rias Baixas, the Austrian Gruners, the Nerello Mascalese reds from the slopes of Mount Etna. They just will not be part of the first team.

Yes, today it is a three-grape world because the grapes have made it so and the wine buyers agree.

Sunday Serendipity
BOOK REVIEW: Drinkology

Sun, 21 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Drinkology--The Art and Science of the Cocktail by James Waller
Revised and Updated Edition, 372 pages, Stewart, Tabori & Chang, New York 2010
Price: US $22.50, Canada $29.50

By Stephen Eliot

In the preface to his newly published revised edition of Drinkology: The Art and Science Of The Cocktail, author James Waller looks back at the remarkable changes in the popular cocktail culture since the book’s initial publication some seven years back.

“Seven years ago, it was difficult to find any brand or type of bitters other than good old Angostura.”

“Seven years ago, you’d be hard pressed to find a single bottle of rye whiskey or Absinthe in most American liquor stores.”

“Seven years ago, it was the rare bar or restaurant that truly cared about the proper mixing and serving of cocktails”.

Such observations among others are followed the by the happy conclusion that things are “wonderfully changed”, and, while celebrating those changes, Drinkology’s new version remains one of the more practical guides to the lore and craft of the cocktail to be had. It is not a coffee-table book. It has no pictures aside from a few scattered sketches, and attention to small details such as a sewn binding that allows it to lie flat on the counter and a waterproof cover much appreciated by stiff-fingered mixologists such as myself says that this is a book from someone who knows his way around a bar.

It does not wander into the esoteric realms of exotic, impossible-to-find ingredients, and it’s very accessible style is seasoned with a bit of irreverence aimed at those whose almost fundamentalist zeal comes with unbending opinions about the one and only right way to do things be it the creation of custom infusions and bitters to strict adherence to classic recipes. In other words, this is a book for real people in real situations, and it succeeds brilliantly at being just that. One of my pet peeves about a good many books on making mixed drinks is that they lack cogent organization and defy easy access, but Waller’s little volume starts with sensible sections on stocking a bar and basic cocktail technique, and then follows with chapters whose topic-tabbed pages are organized by respective spirit types running the gamut from whiskey, rum and brandy to sake, tequila and gin thus making its 450 tried-and-true recipes easy to find. All of the classics are here as are more than a few innovative new drinks, and there is enough information to please the professional and the enthusiastic newcomer alike.

I don’t know that there is any one book that covers everything that I might want and need to know about the topic, but the latest edition of Drinkology has joined Dale deGroff’s The Craft of the Cocktail and Gary Regan’s The Joy of Mixology among those that I reach for first.

Satisfying Saturdays
Eating Well In Sydney

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Chuck Hayward with foreword and post script by Charles Olken

Editors Note: Not long after yesterday’s blog was posted, I received an email from my “down-under” guru. Chuck Hayward is widely acknowledged as one of the West Coast’s most knowledgeable purveyors of wines from and information about wines from Australia and New Zealand. For years, he held court at the misnamed Jug Shop in San Francisco, and lately he has been enlisted as the Wine Educator and Australian and New Zealand wine buyer for the very active online merchant, J. J. Buckley.

Chuck had read the blog and offered to add to my list of chosen restaurants that was promised for this space. And since Chuck has spent even more time and more recent time in Sydney than I have, I upped the ante and suggested that he guest-edit today’s blog with its focus on good eating in Sydney. His recommendations for Rockpool and Bathers Pavilion could have come right out of my personal playbook, and needless to say, I agree with them. Aqua and Quay are new to me, and go straight to the top of my “next time” list. I have added a couple of special spots at the end of Chuck’s recommendations.

Chuck Hayward writes

When it comes to the eating out in Australia, Sydney's dining establishments reflect the city's role as a center of business and its place as the country's center of power even if the capital is an hour's flight south. Where eating out in rival city Melbourne is usually a more intimate experience, Sydney's restaurants are as equally concerned about making the "grand statement" while at the same time affording diners dramatic views of the hills surrounding the beautiful waters of Sydney Harbour. This is not to say that the food isn't good. There is some fantastic food being prepared in the neighborhoods of this energetic metropolis, the problem is keeping abreast of the constant changes. Sydney's dominant paper, the Sydney Morning Herald, publishes the well respected Good Food Guide each year and is always a handy guide for visitors. But nothing can beat the feet on the ground and here are a few favorites from my many visits.

Each of these restaurants is on the pricier end of things, boast impeccable service and winelists that are comprehensive explorations of Australia's regions and styles. Interestingly, Sydney's dining scene also has very liberal BYO approach which is perfect when showing off that Dry Creek Zinfandel to your friends and the waiter.

Aqua Dining: For sheer drama thanks to a beautiful view of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, take a quick ferry from Circular Quay to Maslin Point. Disembarking near the retro Luna Park amusement park, you'll walk past an Olympic sized public pool to a elegantly styled dining room with large windows giving everyone jaw dropping views of the bridge above and the Opera House in the background. With an emphasis on Mod-Oz cuisine highlighting local fish and meat, the flavors are precise and clean and not in the slightest way overbearing. Top-notch wines and efficient service round out a perfect lunch experience.

Bather's Pavilion: Although this is a half hour hike from Sydney's CBD, the trip is worth it as the food and view combine to create a dining experience that is quite relaxed compared to the energy saturated dining rooms of the city proper. For ten years, Serge Dansereau has reigned over this low slung building which once housed changing rooms for swimmers that looks out on a small beach and a view east towards Hunters Bay and the ocean. The dining room is simple and brightly lit during the day which focuses the attention to the table where Serge's strong French cooking techniques are combined with locally sourced ingredients. There is also a strong vegetarian menu option that works perfectly with Sally Harper's well selected wine list.

Golden Century: If you want to enjoy classical Chinese seafood, there is no better place than Golden Century in the Chinatown district. Dishes range from ten bucks to the hundreds of dollars as all manner of fish encased in skin and shell swim in tanks awaiting their destiny. Populated by everyone from starving students, celebrating families, and slick-haired gangster types, you take escalators up to the main dining room to see cabinets holding multiple vintages of Penfolds Grange and Henschke Hill of Grace. As much a wild dining experience that approaches theater, waitresses bring your flopping fish to the table for inspection in a brightly lit cavernous room that sees continuous service til 4am.

Icebergs: In a city where restaraunt views are plenty, sitting atop a small cliff overlooking the ocean and the crescent shape of Bondi Beach has to take the cake. Eating top-notch Italian food with an Aussie temperament in a sleekly designed space that allows the diner to see and be seen is the cream on the cake. With relaxed yet professional service, chef Robert Marchetti takes advantage of local ingredients and adds Tuscan cooking techniques to create food that pays respect to the culinary traditions of both countires. The presentations are clean and elegant and are worthy views in themselves if you could ever stop staring at the ocean.

Quay: The Sydney Opera House remains Australia's architectural icon and directly across the Circular Quay lies the Quay Restaurant which has quickly placed itself as one of the city's iconic dining experiences. In less than ten years, it has become Sydney's leading restaurant with forward culinary thinking expressed on each plate. Not as avant garde as what you might expect in Chicago or Spain, Quay, under the direction of chef Peter Gilmore, nevertheless pushes his food towards a modern statement on the plate without losing sight of the fact that the flavor of each dish's ingredients comes first. In this case, Quay's focus on seafood keeps things light while you look out at yet another stunning view of water, bridge and the Opera House as the ferries and water taxis pass by. Expensive but the well priced lunch menu shows the kitchen's talents perfectly.

Rockpool Bar + Grill: Neil Perry is one of Australia's most popular chefs and Rockpool is where it all started. While Neil has completely remodeled his first home base on the Rocks, his latest venture is the new Rockpool Bar + Grill in the Business District and it has rewritten all the superlatives that can be hurled at a dining establishment. Expensive for sure but the quality and presentation of the best meat that Australia can raise is beyond reproach. But what sets Perry's new effort apart from Sydney's compatriots is a spare-no-prisoners approach to wine. With a wine list that easily covers the best from Australia, head sommelier Sophie Otton steals sommeliers from across the globe (including one from San Fransico’s Gary Danko just recently) as she expands on a wine list that also includes the best from Europe and California. The 3500 bottle list, started when Perry's partner sent the bulk of his $9 million cellar to Sydney, shows wines from Europe and California and is more extensive than anything this city has seen before. One could quibble that Rockpool resembles an upscale American restaurant in Aussie clothing—but that list!!

Charles Olken writes

I am not sure what Chuck means by “resembles an American restaurant”. Great restaurants in great cities all have a buzz to them. In fact, it seems to me that, like it or not, the great countryside restaurants in France and this country are a lot more relaxed than the big city places. But, whatever he means, I like Rockpool. It is simply a great restaurant.

Also at the very top end is Tetsuya’s. For years, this palace of gastronomy has ranked with the best in the world. It has been at the top of the list in Sydney for at least twenty years, and although it is this year surpassed by the likes of Quay and a couple of others in the annual Sydney Restaurant Guide, it has lost none of its luster and still operates in the culinary stratosphere. There is one menu covering eleven courses paced over several hours and priced so high that if you have to ask, you should not go. It reminds me of nothing so much as the Napa Valley’s French Laundry. Be forewarned. Like the great restaurants everywhere, one should make reservations months in advance.

Guillaume at the Bennelong occupies one of the buildings on the platform of the Sydney Opera House. We like to go there for lunch and watch the activity on the harbor.

And I would add Sailor’s Thai to the list. Owner David Thompson’s food is so good that he was invited by the Thai government to go to Thailand and work with chefs there. His building in The Rocks has a canteen where you sit at long tables elbow to cheek with other folks from around the world eating some of the most delicious dishes you can imagine. The building also has white table cloth room with fancier preparations, longer meals and higher prices. Last time in Sydney, the Olkens ate at both.

Chuck made reference to Melbourne, Australia’s second city, and its eating scene. He prefers that city. I prefer Sydney for eating preferences and quality. Both are lovely places. And Melbourne, which has a much more calm pace, and is smaller, plays Boston to New York or San Francisco to Los Angeles. More on Melbourne in a later installment of the blog.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
SYDNEY: Luxuriating in The Land of Oz

Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It seems to me, as I contemplate what I want to tell you about one of my favorite cities in the world, that I am about to write a short story. There is no blog entry, no short article, no collection of several hundred words that can paint the story of this magical place. I need a book. I need days and days just to sort through the various images I want to attach to this piece. I want you to feel what I feel, and that is simply not possible in the space allotted. So, I am going to do the next best thing. I am going to list the first twelve wonders that strike me and let it go at that. I will deal with some of Sydney’s restaurants in tomorrow’s blog.

I love great cities. Places like New York, London, Paris, Barcelona, San Francisco, Amsterdam—and Sydney. Yes, I also like the near great, the smaller, wonderful places too. Boston, Copenhagen, Bilbao, Melbourne, Lyon, Edinburgh, Buenos Aires, Venice, Chicago, Seattle, Vancouver. I will even admit to liking Los Angeles if you promise that you will not ask me to repeat that sentiment again.

And I like Sydney. It is, as I said above, a magical place that is like no other. Some cities are great because they are so big that they offer the best of everything. Sydney is not that big—more like Chicago in size. But Sydney is not just a great city. It is a great place in ways that are unique and exciting. It took me most of my adult life to discover Australia, but I have been back many times and will go again. It is a travel experience that is simply exhilarating if you, like me, love special urban places.

Here are a dozen reasons why.

THE SETTING: Built on water and dominated by that water yet dominating it as well, Sydney is a place of amazing vistas. Restaurants, houses, boats, ferries, waterside museums, even a zoo built on a hillside overlooking the water and downtown Sydney such that one minute you are walking in an enclosure with kangaroos and wallabies and the next, you are gazing at a view that is simply captivating.
THE BOTANICAL GARDENS: Lots of cities have great parks. Indeed, great open spaces are part of what makes a city into a great city. The Botanical Gardens, located right in the heart of the city is just such a place. It is part sculpture garden, part arboretum, part historical storyland. I have walked it from stem to stern and from every direction. And yes, it sits on the water. One of the great urban walks take you from the state museum to the Opera House with half a dozen places to stop in between.
THE ART GALLERY OF NEW SOUTH WALES: Every city in Australia has a “State” museum, and each one of them is worth the visit. Sydney’s is perhaps the most extensive, and every time we visit we find more and more to like. There are three or four special features not to be missed. The collection of aboriginal art in this museum is second to none in the world, and perhaps more importantly, the museum’s collection chronicles the evolution of native art as it made the transition, in just over the last forty years, from unknown to some of the most attractive modern art in the world. And if you are interested in Australia’s modern art, the Gallery is also the place for you. There seem always to be local artists on hand doing something, and the museum’s restaurant with its view out over The Botanical Gardens and the water has become one of the Olken’s favorite lunch spots.
THE OTHER MUSEUMS: Great cities have a variety of great museums and Sydney is no different. No need to list them here except to say that they run the gamut from science to maritime to contemporary to historical.
THE OPERA HOUSE: You have seen it a hundred times in advertisements, in travelogues, but until you see it in person, you cannot begin to understand its complexity and its beauty. We have watched performances in two of its four theaters and eaten in its spectacular restaurant. And when we stay in Sydney, we always stay in a hotel with a view of the water and the Opera House. It is that beautiful.
THE CIRCULAR QUAY: This harbor within a harbor is the hub of Sydney’s water life. Because the main harbor, the largest natural harbor in the world, is essentially a long east-west inlet with housing on both sides, Sydney relies on the water for a very large portion of its transportation system. The Circular Quay is more rectangular than Circular. On the tip of its eastern arm sits the Opera House. From the Opera House to the base of the Quay, there are restaurants, shops and all kinds of attractions. At the base of the Quay is a set of wharves from which the hundreds of ferries that the ply the harbor leave all day and night. Think of it as a central train station for ferries. And on the other arm is a collection of museums and shops, galleries, markets and hotels known as The Rocks.
THE ROCKS: Every city has favored places to stay. In Seattle, I want to be near the Pikes Market. In Edinburgh, on Princes Street. In London in Mayfair and in Paris on the Left Bank. In Sydney, I want to stay in The Rocks. Not only are there hotels that range from affordable to fancy, not only are some of Sydney’s great restaurants here, not only does the Saturday street market offer unique items from down under, The Rocks and its hotels all have views of the Circular Quay and the Opera House. There are plenty of good hotels in the commercial heart of Sydney. They are fine for commercial visitors. Go to a hotel in The Rocks. You won’t be sorry.
THE HARBOUR BRIDGE: The four-hour tour and climb up the bridge, leading to one of the most spectacular outdoor views in the world may be for the hardy, or even the foolhardy if you ask Mrs. Olken who eschewed the opportunity, but think of it this way. You cannot climb to the top of the Golden Gate Bridge or the George Washington Bridge, but you can climb the Harbour Bridge and get an unsurpassed view of the largest natural harbor in the world. Oh, and by the way, it truly is a beautiful harbor.
EATING and DRINKING WELL: I began my love of wine as a foodie. I was the cook for my grad school house, and if I had not married an even better cook, I suspect I would still be a very good cook. As it is, I have retired and am now a very good eater and the family sommelier. Sydney offers an amalgam of world cuisine, local cuisine and almost everything in between. It even has a Thai restaurant so good that the Thai government hired its proprietor to come to Thailand to teach the locals how to elevate the quality and authenticity of their cooking. Look for details tomorrow. And don’t worry about the wine. It is everywhere.
THE TARONGA ZOO: Sydney proper sits on the south side of the elongated harbor. The Zoo occupies a privileged location on the north side. To get there, you take one of the many ferry options from the Circular Quay. When you alight, you take the suspended cable car (Ski Safari) to the top of the hill, pick up a map and walk back down talking an hour or a half day to get there. And don’t miss the walkthrough enclosures where the roos are just feet away.
SYDNEY OLYMPIC PARK: Most cities that house the Olympics spread their venues over very wide areas using existing facilities as much as possible. Sydney built their own for their Olympics and the Park still stands. Sporting enthusiasts, of which I am one, will enjoy a couple of hours wondering around the area and touring the facilities.
BONDI and MANLEY BEACHES: Both of these beaches are on the ocean at the very eastern extremes of the greater metropolitan area. Bondi, with its fancy restaurants and beautiful people, is the more famous. Manley, which is on the north shore, requires a lovely ferry boat ride that traverses the entire length of the harbor from the Circular Quay to the place where harbor meets the ocean. You alight from the ferry inside the harbor and walk along the pedestrian mall to the beach. Take your pick—Bondi or Manley, fancy or quiet. Both are worth the visit. Although truth be known, I prefer Manley.

There is a lot more to this short story, but, you will find far more details and more extensive graphics in books and on the Internet. And, if you have hankering for a holiday that does not involve one of the usual suspects in this country or in Europe, Sydney may well be the place for you. And the Hunter Valley and other wine areas are not all that far away. For the most famous Aussie wine districts, however, you will have to venture further. And there is no harm in that either.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Latest News To Amuse

Thu, 18 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

As we head into the Thanksgiving week, or Big Game football weekend for those of us who care such things, we take time to reflect on events of the past week and to bring the most important and unusual to your attention. And we start today with an item that makes us insanely jealous. No one treats us this way. No one tries to beat our subscription system to steal our latest ratings. No, we are not the Wine Spectator and grateful for it.

ITEM: Spectator's Wine of The Year Revealed
“We have advanced the announcement of the Wine of the Year! This decision was made in the interest of fairness to all our loyal readers after a breach of our website”.

GRADE: Incomplete. Fine, you have made an announcement but you haven’t told us the name of the wine. And, to make matters worse, Connoisseurs’ Guide has not even yet compiled its list of our Wines of The Year—due to appear in our December Issue. And without our Best of 2010, there is yet to be a Wine of The Year. And with apologies for sounding snarky and even somewhat sanctimonious, how often have Spectator Wines of The Year caused folks to snicker? But, yes, someone does care enough to break into your website. That does put the Spectator on a level above the rest of us.

ITEM: Cosentino Closes Last Two Wineries
ITEM: Fred Couples and Mitch Cosentino Form Couples & Co.

GRADE: A. Mitch Cosentino is a good guy. He started small, unlike so many of his Napa Valley neighbors who were megabucks rich, and he slowly built, yes with financial investors along the way, a small but decent business making pretty good wine. Back when he and we were younger, much younger, Mitch was a frequent member of our tasting panel. It is sad to see his major empire shut down. It is much better to celebrate his major success with his new label and new partner. Good for Mitch. He was making lemonade even before his lemons were hatched. He may be an old golfer but apparently he has not lost his balls.

ITEM: Jeannie Cho Lee Buys 105,000-Euro Truffle
“A giant white truffle was sold off on Sunday to the Hong Kong-based wine critic for 105,000 euros (144,000 dollars) at a lavish auction near the town of Alba.”

GRADE: A. Take that, Robert Parker.

ITEM: Plonk Wine Merchants Announce Launch of Its “Cutting Edge” Wine Club
The Los Angeles-based online retailer has announced is “wine of the month club”. For some $100 per month you get four bottles of cheap wine.

GRADE: C. Giving credit where credit is due, you have to like the oxymoronic nature of this businesses name. Spending that kind of money on cheap wine is also oxymoronic. But, hey, there is an entire industry out there of wine of the month clubs based on cheap wine. Most, however, do not ask $100 a month. Better that those folks should subscribe to Connoisseurs’ Guide. Our Best Buys will get them a heck of lot good and not expensive wine for their C-notes.

Wine And Food Wednesday: SPECIAL REPORT
Fizz Through Rose-Colored Glasses

Wed, 17 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Since commenting on Champagne and its underappreciated ability to partner with food last week, we have read more commentary on the topic, listened to more opinions and have run into more new, hitherto-untasted bottles than we usually might over the course of a good many months. It is likely because the holidays are beginning to loom, but it is funny sometimes how the whole world seems to turn and at once cast an eye in exactly the same direction, and all of the attention in conversation, print and on line has us thinking more on the topic ourselves. First, we have a confession to make. We are known to drink a glass or three of the bubbly now and then. We like it as the first wine on an evening’s merriment and we find it to be splendid stuff for washing down oysters, and as a winning mate to many foods, if the truth be known. And there is that special place in our hearts when the bubbles come with a bit of color.

We believe it was the late Harry Waugh who once said the first duty of any wine was to be red, and, if we may borrow shamelessly from Harry, we think that pink or something close to it is how sparkling wine was meant to be. A number of fine Rosés stood out in a group of grower Champagnes we recently tasted our ways through (look for that report coming soon), and just this past Sunday, San Francisco Chronicle wine editor Jon Bonné seemed to be reading our minds when giving thumbs up to a number of local pinks. As Jon observed, and we are in whole agreement, well-made Rosés have an edge in complexity and richness that makes them all that more interesting and food-friendly. They are high on our list of favorites with well-seasoned salmon, chicken in cream sauce and buttery quail chasseur, and few wines are so welcome at brunch. And, yes, they are outstanding wines for the coming Thanksgiving dinner, a meal that can be a bit tricky when it comes to finding a wine that is as comfortable with simple roast turkey as with the more savory surrounding fare that is what the meal is more often about. You will be surprised at just how good the next-day turkey sandwiches can be when matched up with a rosy glass of fizz. In the review of California sparkling wine for our November issue, the Rosés stood out as the most decorated class among local bubblies.

And, just the other day, we were invited by Schramsberg, who used the occasion to show off its as yet unreleased J. Schram Rose 2003 in direct competition with the wines below, to taste a selection of what are arguably the very finest Rosés to be had, the Téte de Cuvée bottlings from some of Champagne’s more storied names. They are expensive, running from $300 to $500 a piece, but we include our notes just in case you have a rich uncle who would like to know what to bring to this year’s Thanksgiving dinner. The J. Schram more than held its own, but, because it is not yet released and thus was not tasted in our usual setting, we are not providing a tasting note for it at this time. It is, however, a serious contender in this special company. All wines were tasted blind by an assembled collection of writers and industry professionals, mostly sommeliers from some of San Francisco’s top restaurants. The notes below, however, reflect the opinions of your faithful editors.

91 KRUG Rosé High in autolyzed yeast and showing all of the layered complexity of lengthy aging, this non-vintaged bottling is a classic expression of the Krug style. It is, in all truth, not as concerned with fruit as many, but its very firm balance, fine foamy mousse and its tart, exceptionally long flavors will not disappoint those who revere the name.

94 LOUIS ROEDERER Cristal Rosé 2002
This beautifully composed and absolutely riveting wine combines the best of all worlds. It is keenly bubbled by an extraordinarily long-lasting mousse, fit with autolyzed complexities galore and finds at its heart the very deep and convincing fruity substance that is the first responsibility of fine Rosé. It has the richness and breadth to drink famously with a wide range of foods, but it is so refined and keenly crafted as to be a sheer joy on its own.

93 MOÉT Dom Perignon Rosé 2002
Every bit a Rosé in terms of its essential vinosity, this very rich and well-structured wine exhibits remarkable balance between yeasty complexity and very deep Pinot Noir fruit. It is a mouthfilling wine with the strength and stamina to stand up to richer foods, but it is uncannily light on its feet and shows real Champagne style and breeding from beginning to end.

95 PERRIER JOUET Fleur de Champagne Rosé 2002
Although so rich and yeasty that images of fresh-baked brioche leap to mind, this lovely, wonderfully refined wine comes with a marked boost in fruitiness when compared to its mates. There is something akin to California juiceness deep down at its heart, and while it has real Rosé richness and weight, it is free of astringency and just about as polished as they come.

89 VEUVE CLICQUOT PONSARDIN Grande Dame Brut 1998
A bit darker in color and a little more vinous that was the norm, this particular bottling of 1998 La Grande Dame seemed to be getting a little long in the tooth. It was solidly champenized and displayed a fair sense of structure and strength, but it was also beginning to dry out.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Definitions—Part 2

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

All seriousness aside (rimshot, please), our government has asked for comments regarding the definitions of the certain wine label terminology.

Here, in order to insure complete accuracy and to keep from laughing out loud while we type, is the unedited text from our government. Be sure to read it in full. But, not to worry, we will provide a translation at the end.

Sections 105(e) and 105(f) of the Federal Alcohol Administration Act (FAA Act), codified in the United States Code at 27 U.S.C. 205(e) and 205(f), set forth standards for the regulation of the labeling and advertising of alcohol beverage products, including wine, as that term is defined in 27 U.S.C. 211. These provisions give the Secretary of the Treasury the authority to issue regulations to prevent deception of the consumer with respect to such products, to provide the consumer with ``adequate information'' as to the identity and quality of the product, and to prohibit false or misleading statements. Additionally, these FAA Act provisions give the Secretary the authority to prohibit, irrespective of falsity, statements relating to age, manufacturing processes, analyses, guarantees, and scientific or irrelevant matters which are likely to mislead the consumer. The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) is responsible for the administration of the FAA Act and the regulations promulgated under it. The labeling and advertising regulations for wine are codified in title 27 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), parts 4, 9, 12, 13, and 16.

TRANSLATION: We’ve got the power, and we are going to use it.

The following terms are listed by TTB in their request for comments, but they have not stopped there. If you do not see a term on the list and you want it defined, all you need to do is to say so. Lawyers all over the country are firing up their computers now. Even “Old Lawyers”, defined as those born before the Repeal of Prohibition, are getting their Smith Coronas ready for action.

Here is the list—and remember, if you don’t like the list, you can always go out and make one of your own. I would start with “vinted”, which is the past participle of the verb “to vint”. I want to know what this word means. It does not exist in the English language yet our government allows its use on wine labels.

Estate
Estates
Estate-Grown
Reserve
Old Vine
Barrel Fermented
Proprietor's Blend
Single Vineyard
Old Clone
Vineyard Select
Select Harvest
Bottle Aged
Barrel Select

I worry, however, that you are going to spend a great deal of time with these terms, and perhaps some of you are going to ask your lawyers for help. Indeed, rumor on the street and in the selected vineyards and estates is that you already have. But, for those of you who have not yet jumped into the fray, I highly recommend the comments that have appeared recently on the excellent blog entitled Fermentation, authored by the Godfather of the wine blogosphere, Tom Wark.

Click on the banner to read his insightful additions to the conversation. I guarantee that you will come away with a deeper appreciation for the meanings of those words and for our government’s attempt to keep unscrupulous “vinters”—the correct adaptation of the verb “to vint”—from abusing us with dastardly bastardizations of those terms’ true meanings.

Monday Manifestos
Wine World Definitions

Mon, 15 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Boys and girls, your government is hard at work creating jobs, and that’s a good thing. The economy has been in a rut for far too long. Not only is the unemployment rate high, but we keep hearing reports that hundreds of wineries are in financial trouble. Just this week, the San Francisco Financial times warned us that just because such warnings have so far led to nothing, the day of reckoning could be just around the corner. However, today’s Manifesto does not concern itself with winery bankruptcies,. No one is going bankrupt for the holidays. It just isn’t done in polite society, and the wine world is not anything if not polite.

Today, we are worried about definitions in the wine world. We are worried because the Government is worried, and our government has set about to create lots of new jobs with its proposal to define all kinds of words that are currently all too “free form”. You, the consumer, are being duped by the use of these undefined terms, and our government is going to save you and is going to create lots of jobs in the process. The problem is that these will not be jobs for the average working “Joe”. What our government is doing is creating more jobs for lawyers. On the whole, that is not such a bad thing. Shakespeare knew what to do with the surplus supply of lawyers, and if you think about it, it is probably better to employ the lawyers than to line up with Bill and his rather too draconian solution to the lawyer surfeit.

But before getting to my proposed wording of the definitions that are the subject of the government’s and the lawyers’ concerns, I want to thank the government for something it never saw coming. The “Law of Unintended Consequences” is part and parcel of every move our government makes. And in this case, despite offering us another version of the “Full Employment for Lawyers Act”, our government has inadvertently and unexpectedly and much to everyone’s chagrin in and out of the wine world, also created a de facto “Full Employment for Wine Bloggers Act” because every blogger from here to Bar Harbor has just been handed free grist for the mill. We bloggers thank our government for this latest installment of the Stimulus Program. We bloggers are going to earn our jobs the old-fashioned way. We are going to write.

Tomorrow’s blog entry will point you to the definitions offered by a man who is a lot smarter than we are and whose words were the first to appear in print. But, that will be tomorrow. This is today and this is our blog so we get to go first around here. Take that, Tom Wark. Yes, the hardworking elves here in the Connoisseurs’ Guide vineyard, now fully rested from our jobs of pushing up the vines in biodynamic vineyards, have labored all weekend on providing the answers that our government is waiting to hear. And just remember, folks, that this blog could have been a lot more tedious today. We could have blogged about Pierce Disease vectors or waste water treatment at wineries—or the need for wineries to use Twitter effectively to sell wine lest a whole bunch of twenty-somethings, who go by the unfortunate name of Millennials, turn to Red Bull or Four Loko for their tipple of choice.

Well, folks, that brings us to the end of our allotted time for today. You are not going to hear us tell you what “Old Vines” means, or even that more difficult to comprehend term, “Old Vine”. Making wine from one vine per bottle is certainly possible, and we were going to lobby for each bottle of Old Vine Zinfandel to be identified by the vine from which it came. Of course, I am actually quite pleased to put off this intellectual exercise until another day because I have not yet decided whether “Old Vine” wines should tell us the row and vine number (my idea) or whether, like our government that eventually settles for the winery definitions in these matters, I should simply accept a GPS locator number or a close-up from a Google Earth map.

But, folks, don’t change that dial. I will be back tomorrow with Tom Wark’s definitions.

Sunday Serendipity
Have Some Madeira, My Dear

Sun, 14 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Madeira is one of the most complex and fascinating wines to be had, and, in the United States today, few truly great wines are so misunderstood or underappreciated. Given the wine’s historical significance in America – glasses of Madeira were raised by its framers to toast the creation of the Declaration of Dependence, and Madeira was considered the most prestigious of all wines by wealthy Americans in the 18th and 19th centuries – I have often wondered at how domestic markets seem so stubbornly bound to ignore its existence. Lately, there are new glimmers of interest, and, while I would not support claims that we are suddenly in the midst of a full-blown Madeira renaissance, I am heartened by the increased availability of first-rate bottlings and by the growing enthusiasm with which they are being received.

Much of the credit for Madeira’s rising fortunes must be given to the Rare Wine Company of Sonoma and its founder Mannie Burke. Mr. Burke and company not only manage the most extensive list of fine vintage Madeiras to be had in this country, they have teamed with Ricardo Diogo Vasconcelos Freitas, owner of Madeira’s Vinhos Barbeito to create a line of remarkable offerings drawn from stocks of old wines that are meant to mimic the great wines of the past. The Rare Wine Company “Historic Series” is the end result of this collaboration, and, simply put, every one of the many wines that have I have tasted has been nothing short of remarkable. Principally comprised of examples of Madiera’s four great varietal’s and named after the great American cities where the Madeira trade once flourished, the Historic Series includes the Charleston Sercial, Savannah Verdelho, Boston Bual and New York Malmsey. The wines are priced in the fifty-dollar price range and are several orders magnitude deeper and more compellingly complex than the usual five to ten year old entry-level Madeiras on the market.

Of special note and the spur for this Sunday’s posting, the Rare Wine Company has just released a limited commemorative set of all four wines bottled in specially commissioned half-bottles. There are only 750 sets produced, thus their finding may not be all that easy, but at a retail price of $95.00, they strike me as nothing less than an out and out bargain. Long-time lovers of Madiera and those whose interest is piquing are well-advised to check out the market and buy what they can while supplies last.

http://www.rarewineco.com/index.htm

Satisfying Saturdays
Bistro Jeanty

Sat, 13 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

91 Bistro Jeanty 6510 Washington Street Yountville, CA 94599 www.bistrojeanty.com

If you look at most definitions of “bistro”, you will find that they always have the word informal somewhere prominently stated. And it is true that bistros in Paris and the rest of France are certainly less formal than the pricey, formal restaurants that require reservations long in advance and reach deeply into your wallet. But, bistros are not uniform in quality or intent any more than a white table cloth and a maitre d’ in a tuxedo guarantees one of anything except a large check at the end of the night.

There are bistros whose owners treat them as “almost fancy” restaurants and there are bistros that pass for nothing more than neighborhood restaurants. And then there are what I want from a bistro—a restaurant that does not have its nose in the air but does serve the best kinds of comfort foods. The ideal French-styled bistro will have a menu that is straight off the streets of Paris. Bistro Jeanty, although run by a Champenois, is as close to Paris as one can get. Its menu is so classic that just reading it makes my mouth water. And while Yountville, which is the continuing theme from yesterday to today, has some 45 restaurants all told, some of which are as upscale as upscale can get (think French Laundry and Bardessano), Bistro Jeanty is all bistro.

I can suggest a couple of special dishes here that I almost never overlook, but I will admit upfront that I am being unfair to the rest of the menu. You can find it on the website, and you will not see a Calif-Med dish or a fusion dish or a nouvelle cuisine dish in sight. Have a look for yourself. This is old-fashioned down home French comfort food—very good comfort food.

That said, I personally have two items I order more than others and they are better here than I have had in Paris at similarly cast restaurants. The first is the tomato soup en croute. No more delightfully tomatoey/savory potion exists. And the second is Boeuf En Daube, long cooked hunks of beef, often chuck although Mrs. Olken makes hers with rib lifters—those tender chunks of beef the sit above the fat layer on a rib roast of beef. It is a stew of sorts, although not usually endowed with veggies—just beef cooked for hours until it melts in your mouth and is served with a rich brown cooking sauce.

But my personal items are just that—personal. My dining companions have dragged me (willingly, I might add) back to Bistro Jeanty to have the Steak Tartare, the Cassoulet, the Steak Frites. Every one of the fifteen first courses and dozen entrees will remind you of France. Yes, this is the Napa Valley where you can find almost every kind of food if you look for it. It is a place that attracts visitors and serves them every manner of dish. Yet, there is a reason why Bistro Jeanty is the most popular Yountville restaurant in Trip Advisor and why the Guide Michelin continues to recognize its excellence. You will not go wrong here.

Bistro Jeanty
6510 Washington Street
Yountville, CA 94599
(707) 944-0103
www.bistrojeanty.com

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Yountville—The Gateway To The Napa Valley

Fri, 12 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Most villages in wine country are attractive. And Yountville is no different. For years, it has stood there guarding the roadway to what most people think of as the Napa Valley. Of course, there have always been vines south of Yountville in what is now called the Oak Knoll District, and the term Napa Valley was rather too broadly used on wine labels, and, with the advent of the AVA system of geographic identification, there were arguments to be made for restricting the use of the name to the Valley proper and not every corner of Napa County. Those arguments lost out to historical usage, but, be that as it may, the Napa Valley as a land mass starts somewhere north of Napa City and south of Yountville.

Of course, the vines have now pushed out south of Napa City, and that proud enclave has undergone a regeneration, a resurgence such that it certainly could be called the “Gateway”. I just can’t do it however, because the road to the Napa Valley goes around the city itself and, for me, it is still Yountville that signals my emotional arrival in the Napa Valley.

Yountville, itself has changed greatly over the years. Back when I started writing, there was not much in Yountville. A pretty good restaurant called The French Laundry sprung up, and while it occupied the same building as Thomas Keller’s now world famous destination, it was a much more relaxed dining experience. In fact, as equally famous as the old French Laundry, and often a more difficult ticket was a Mexican restaurant whose breakfasts were large, tasty and just the right fuel to launch a day of tasting and touring. It is now gone, and the list of fine eating establishments in Yountville would put most cities its size to shame.

Just to name the first half dozen that come to mind: The French Laundry, Bistro Jeanty, Bouchon, Bottega, Redd, Bobby Hurley’s, Domaine Chandon’s Etoile, Ad Hoc and—oops that’s eight and there are a dozen more famous places. Of course, Yountville is not only about food. It has good wine shops and plenty of other attractions right there in the heart of town from galleries to all kinds of shops to a very fine array of hotels, inns and B & Bs. The new Bardessano, which also boasts a fine restaurant and its own wines is the place to stay for the well-heeled while the rest of us might opt for the Vintage Inn or even the fanciest Best Western imaginable.

And then there are the wineries. Before you even get to Yountville, in the Oak Knoll District, you will see Trefethen on the right and Laird on the left. In the center of town, you can visit Blackbird, Mason and lots of others. To the west of Yountville town center are Domaine Chandon and Dominus. To the east is the Stags Leap District with its many producers like Stag’s Leap and Stags’ Leap—the first being the famous Cabernet producer whose full name is Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars and the second, more know for Petite Sirah, but also making Cabernet goes by the name of Stags’ Leap Winery. And please do not confuse the two or the placement of the apostrophes in their names. It took years of lawsuits to sort all that out.

The only problem I have with Yountville is that once I pull off the highway and drive into town, I find it hard to leave. I am guessing you will have the same happy problem when you visit.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
New News Fit To Spit

Thu, 11 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Wine News continues to amuse and amaze. Nothing wrong with that. As long as the industry, from winery to writers and everything in between and Sideways (sorry, just could not resist that one), keeps rolling out the items, we will keep on reporting them to you.

ITEM: Menlo Park council narrowly approves BevMo

I know Menlo Park. I lived there for a year while in grad school. Of course, I moved to Palo Alto proper a year later and liked it a lot more, but Menlo Park is OK with me. But, I just don’t get this “narrowly approves BevMo” stuff. This is a city with large chain stores and is suffering great angst over a store planned to sit in a strip mall that includes a Staples and Big 5 Sporting Goods. One council member put it this way (please no snickering at the end), “We think BevMo does not fit in Menlo Park but it does fit into this shopping center”. And where is this shopping center? Why on Menlo Park’s busiest street along with all the other big volume stores. There is one downside to this story however. Beltramo’s, the long-standing premier wine merchant on the mid-Peninsula, is just down the street and will now face competition for customers. Folks, I know Beltramo’s and I know BevMo. Beltramo’s will be just fine. It is a hands-on wine merchant with a very good selection of goods. Sure, some of its trade will directly compete with BevMo, but much of it simply will not. The argument about too much competition is about as valid as CGCW complaining that the Wine Spectator is allowed to be sold in California. Sorry, Menlo Park, but you don’t look good on this one even though I still love you.

Our Grade: C-

ITEM: Why France matters in world of wine

“The French have bequeathed much to the world of wine. Here are 5 reasons to raise a glass in their honor.”

This from the Chicago Tribune, penned by a self-confessed “wine peep”. He probably posted it first on Twitter or Facebook. Of course, the whole world knew what was coming after that introduction so I will just tick off the items with just enough rant to tickle your funny bone and exorcise my amazement—

Wine words: We should love the French because they have given us words like brut and blanc de blancs, cuvée and chaptalization. Never mind that we don’t practice chaptalization much here because can get our grapes ripe enough that no sugar is needed to raise the wine to acceptable levels of body and richness.
At the table: “The French taught us that wine went with food”. I guess all that wine made in amphora in Persia and Egypt was only for show. People did not really drink it. And you can forget about Italian wine. According to the Tribune’s wine peep, the Italians made no good wine until the 1960s. I guess that stuff I was drinking in the North End of Boston in my college days, you know the stuff that came in those little round bottles with straw baskets, was not good enough to go with Joe Tecce’s Cannelloni. Silly me. I never minded it. My roommates and I thought we were pretty cool taking our dates to an authentic Italian restaurant and ordering wine. I guess we should have sent it back because it was not French.
Good Grapes: “Where would we wine peeps be without the Cabernet—Sauvignon and Franc, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Chenin Blanc?” Well, you wine peeps would just have to drink Tempranillo, Grenache, Zinfandel, Riesling, Torrontes, Albarino, Nebbiolo, Sangiovese.
Terroir: “How the voice of the place murmurs through the grapes”. I kid you not. That is an actual quote. Apparently, terroir did not exist in the Napa Valley or the Mosel or Tuscany until the French discovered it.
AOC: “The laws that govern grape growing and wine production”. Yes, folks, France matters because it has a system of hidebound rules and regulations that cannot be bent. No matter that some south facing hillsides in Beaujolais, just a stones throw north of the Rhône region, have the same soils as the Côte Rotie and are better suited to Syrah than to Gamay. If you do as a several Rhône winemakers have done, and buy land on those hillsides to grow Syrah, you will not be able to identify the wine as anything but common plonk with no name and no appellation. Never mind that the overheated summer of 2003 practically killed off the vines in many parts of France, that you could not add any water to the parched and dying vineyards without an order from the very top of the government. The progressive French winemakers are butting their heads up against the AOC system and are delighted to tell you so in private. They are smart enough not to fight about it in public or tell wine peeps.

Grade: D

ITEM: Bidding farewell to wine writing

By BILL DALEY
Chicago Tribune
Published: Monday, Nov. 8, 2010 - 12:00 am

You'll notice that I'm not doing my usual column today. That's because my last call for "Uncorked" was a week ago with that article on Carmignano.

The above, taken from the pages of the Chicago Tribune, tells you all you need to know about why the ITEM directly above exists. Bill Daley, the Trib’s long-standing and highly regarded wine columnist has stepped down.

Okay, so it’s not so funny, folks. Good winewriting is a joy. Poorly conceived winewriting sets us all back and confuses the people who read newspaper wine columns hoping to learn something.

Grade: A. For years of good winewriting.

Wine And Food Wednesday
Sparkling Wine and Food Matches

Wed, 10 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Given the astonishing amount of free advice available these days, I suppose it is not surprising a random sampling of blogger-provided electronic commentary leads to the inevitable conclusion the Champagne and its sparkling cousins pair beautifully with just about everything. Hmm, once again I feel the curmudgeon in me start to stir, and, while I am delighted that Champagne is getting its just due as a brilliant mealtime companion, I find it hard to sit silent when I see a grand bottle of bubbles acclaimed the perfect foil to barbecued spareribs in sweet sauce or spicy brisket chili. Now, in truth, I do think that outside of teaming a crisp sparkler with very sweet foods that emphasize the wine’s acidity (and remember, Champagne and most of its pretenders are quite high in acid), it is hard to go horribly wrong. If, however, the idea is to let the wine show its best and serve as more than a simple palate refresher, then there are some wine-friendly foods that are worthy of note, and that point was brought home this week when Charlie and I attended a fascinating sparkling wine luncheon in San Francisco put on by the folks at Schramsberg.

We began by tasting our ways through a select offering of the very finest French Tête de Cuvée Rosés and then followed with a succession of various amuses matched up with several of Schramsberg’s current releases. We will have more to say about the altogether stunning Rosés in the days ahead, but, as it is Wednesday, food-and-wine affinity gets top billing today. I have long thought that eggs, an especially tricky match with table wines, are especially sympathetic partners to sparkling wine when prepared in most any way. Deviled eggs made with a mustard crème fraiche and topped with fried capers and a touch of anchovy were, as expected, a delicious accompaniment to every wine, while a simple bite of roasted beets and ricotta played beautifully against those marginally sweeter bottlings made with a slightly higher dosage. The tuna crudo came across as a too rich for the lightest wines, and those edging to sweetness seemed to bring out a certain “fishiness” in the dish, but an emphatically yeasty, older reserve bottling made the match a solid success, the moment was a reminder of many eye-opening dinners that I can recall where the richness of well-aged Champagnes played beautifully against lighter meats and game birds, especially those served in mushroom-influenced sauces. (As an aside, the main course that followed was a meaty short rib napped in a truffled jus, and while the sparklers were all but irrelevant and no attempt was made to suggest otherwise, I thoroughly enjoyed my last sip of the reserve with a spoon of the sauce.) The most surprising and, I am sure, slightly controversial pairing was bubbly and bacon-wrapped dates sitting atop a garlic-fennel puree. No way, I thought as I took my first sip, but I must admit to being at least conditionally won over. Both salty and fatty foods are fairly classic matches for the acidy bite of top-notch bubbly, and deep-fried dishes from chicken to calamari to tempura and seafoods in cream sauce are sure-fire hits. In this case, the fat of the bacon tempered the date’s sweetness just enough to make a fine match with younger, slightly fruitier wines, and, if I am to be entirely truthful, I should not have been all that surprised as I remember unexpectedly transcendent enjoyment when washing down a perfect bacon-lettuce-and-tomato sandwich after a CGCW tasting last month with a half-bottle of leftover Blanc de Noir Brut!

All in all, the afternoon was well spent and only added to our long-held convictions that those who think of Champagne and fine sparkling wines solely in terms of the occasional toast or simple aperitif drinking are missing a world of very real pleasure.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
In Which We Reward The Awards

Tue, 09 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Good Grape
(www.goodgrape.com)

Jeff Lefevere writes a blog entitled The Good Grape. He is one among hundreds of amateurs who have invaded the Internet with their comments and observations about the wine scene. His blog could have been just another among the milling flock that have something to say but say very little.

Jeff Lefevere writes a blog entitled The Good Grape. It is among the top 3% of all blogs on the Internet in terms of visits and among the top 1% of wine blogs. Not bad for anyone. Great for someone who has no role in the wine business and learned his lessons the old-fashioned way—by tasting and reading, by observation and assessing, by working hard at his avocation and by being very smart in the bargain.

Jeff Lefevere writes a blog entitled The Good Grape. It is dry, tightly constructed, rarely a barrel of laughs, does not get nearly the level of argy-bargy that occurs over on SteveHeimoff.com. But Jeff Lefevere has an advantage over Heimoff and Asimov (NY Times winewriter and his blog, The Pour), over Tom Wark’s Fermentation, and The Connoisseurs’ Blog.

Jeff Lefevere writes a blog entitled the The Good Grape, and it exists “outside the beltway”. He is not part of the old boys’ network. He is unfailingly honest. He is insightful. His blog is must reading because he sees the wine world at arm’s length when so many of us who write about wine see it from the inside.

Today’s Best of The Blogs goes to The Good Grape because it has spent the last week handing out a series of awards in various categories related to wine. Today’s entry, Part IV, hands out awards to wine glasses, wine books and wine philanthropists. I am honored that my new book is among those mentioned, and even though finished out of the money, it is an honor to be in the race alongside the great books that Jeff considered to be tops this year.

Parts I, II and III ran earlier this week. Below is an excerpt from Part III. For more, you will simply have to go to The Good Grape (www.goodgrape.com) yourself.

Quote of the Year
As seen in the Santa Rose Press-Democrat and attributed to Michael Collins, owner and winemaker at Limerick Lane Winery in Healdsburg, in response to harvest this year:
“In farming, every now and then, you get a baseball bat across the face. We got that this year.”

Our Guidebook Reviewed

Tue, 09 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

From Tom Wark's Fermentation
fermentation.typepad.com

I am not one to toot my own horn too loudly, but I guess I am just vain enough to want my family, friends, and readers to see the following review of the The New Connoisseurs' Guidebook. Tom Wark's generous comments have left me with a smile a mile wide.

Allow me to quote Charles Olken from the preface of his newest book "The New Connoisseurs' Guidebook to California Wine & Wineries":

"It is now three decades since my first book, The Connoisseurs' Handbook of California Wine, appeared in print."

Olken, through numerous editions of that original Handbook, and through his newsletter, The Connosseurs' Guide To California Wine (born in 1974), has been regulatory and habitually chronicling the California wine landscape longer than anyone I know. He understands its evolution, where the bodies are buried, the best way to dig them up, which ones are worth digging up, as well as the which of the newest bodies are worth investigating.

It's that knowledge and that perspective, not to mention the superb profile of the California wine industry—from land to producer—found in his The Connoisseurs' Guidebook to California Wine that makes this book a must-have reference for wine lovers.

Again, it is best to quote from the preface to describe what this new issue attempts to do:

"Rather than providing one encyclopedic alphabetical list, this book takes readers into every identifiable appellation from which wine is made. Then it identifies the key producers in each of those wine regions. The accompanying maps will show the locations of each area and the general location of each winery mentioned in the text."

Put another way, this 400+ page paperback issued by University of California Press and written in conjunction with Joseph Furstenthal, is indispensable.

The bulk of this new book is comprised of profiles of 500 California wineries, each of which is a short essay on the winery, what Charles and Joseph find most compelling about the wineries' output, and with important details of how to contact and gain more information about the wineries. Wineries are presented within chapters based on counties and appellations. And each appellation is profiled to-boot.

The authors are generous, too, to other chroniclers of the California wine scene, including as they do a "Reading List" that consists of profiles of books, magazines, newsletters, blogs and websites that ought to be perused by those wanting to expand their education. In addition, an outstanding chapter on the the "Language of Wine" is presented in which some of the less accessible and useful wine-related terms and definitions are provided.

What one does not find in this Guidebook, thankfully, are detailed tasting notes and scores on specific wines. That is left to Olken's newsletter, within which one can find all the scores and notes you could ever want. Rather, this Guidebook is a low flying birds eye view of the California landscape that will leave the reader with an outstanding understanding of the scope of this state's wine industry and an introduction to its most important players.

By its nature, ""The New Connoisseurs' Guidebook to California Wine & Wineries" is a snapshot in time that will require updating in a few years. However, by my reckoning, this snapshot will prove reliable for some time to come. New wineries will come, and some in this book are likely to go in time...But not many of them. This new Handbook should prove to be one of my library's most important and most used editions for some time to come.

This book comes VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Monday Manifestos
Whose Harvest Report to Believe

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Let’s be clear. Winemakers are artists, or at least artisans. They are trained professionals who work for years before a chosen few of them advance to positions of leadership. They have training, they have experience, they have wisdom, and they are universally endowed with a sense of optimism for their latest vintage no matter what challenges Mother Nature has thrown at them.

I visited with several winemakers late last week and received some very revealing answers to what I call the secondary questions. You see, if you ask the primary question, “How have things turned out overall?”, you get answers like, “we did pretty well all things considered” and “we will be able to make some pretty good wines this year”. But when you start reading between the lines and seek out specifics, then you get to real truth. And, folks, the real truth is not pretty.

”How was the Zinfandel”, I asked one maker who does a good trade in that variety. “Lost some vineyards to sunburn and then lost almost all the rest to the rains”. Translation: When the vintage got so far behind, many vineyards underwent what is called “leaf thinning” in which grapes that were shaded by leaves get exposed to sun in the hope that direct exposure will push them along faster. What happened next was a heat spike that literally burned up thin-skinned varieties like Zinfandel and shut down heat-sensitive varieties like Chardonnay.

Chardonnay, at least, being an early-ripening variety got mostly picked and some of it should be pretty good. But Zinfandel, being a thin-skinned variety with tight clusters and being one of the last varieties to come in, never likes rain, and did not at all like the heavy rains we had last month. North Coast Zin production is simply going to be way down. Paso Robles Zin production has been less hard hit, and some of the most optimistic, and believable, reports are coming from down that way.

In fact, if there has been one continuing drumbeat of optimism, it has been for the grapes grown south of San Francisco where conditions were closer to normal. Or at least, that is theory. But, one producer, in answering the question, “how much did you crush this year?”, admitted that his tonnage was down 40% because he refused to take some grapes coming from as far south as Santa Barbara County. No point in picking “grapes that have sugared up but are mushy in condition and have no flavor”.

Winemakers are pros. They are going to make some good wines in 2010. California is not a monolithic place with uniform conditions, uniform crop loads, exposures, winery expectations. Some of the early ripening varieties will have done just fine. Other batches that take a little longer to mature may not have. Wines that were said to have come in with higher acidities and lower pHs than normal have turned out to be remarkably average even in those technical measures.

And, when one reads today’s’ blog over at Steve Heimoff.com and hears a couple of winemakers trying to make the case for thin, herbal Cabernet Sauvignon, then you get the idea that optimism may be expected but reality is beginning to bite.

The harvest this year has been challenged. Very few folks would deny that. Thin, herbal Cabernet is being compared to Bordeaux, and one can understand how optimists would want to think that way. But, the proof is going to be in the tasting, and we are still some time away from that. In the meantime, let’s all remember that wine is not measured by words and that early assessments of vintages have been wrong too many times, on both the positive and the negative. Keep your fingers crossed, folks, this is going to be a rough ride.

Sunday Serendipity
The Return of a Whiskey Legend

Sun, 07 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

A couple of weeks back, Bourbon was our Sunday topic, and a new acquisition brings it back to the spotlight. While recently sniffing out new and interesting spirits, I found something special in a special place, and both the whiskey and the purveyor deserve applause. The bottle is a Single-Barrel Private Selection from Four Roses, and Ledger’s Liquors in Berkeley.

A bit of background first. Four Roses is located in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky and during the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s was the best-selling Bourbon in America. In the 1950s, however, its owner, Seagram’s, pulled the brand from the American market and focused exclusively on international sales. Kirin Brewery of Japan purchased Four Roses in 2002 and, at the urging of Master Distiller Jim Rutledge, began to distribute the brand first in Kentucky and then more recently to a broader national market . I have enjoyed both the distillery’s basic yellow-label bottling and more limited small-batch releases, but its single-barrel offerings simply rank among the very best Bourbons that I have tasted. One of the latter, in fact, is what inspired this Sunday’s musings and is the kind of stuff to squirrel away for special moments. Four Roses is unique in that it employs two different mash bills (the blend of grains whose starches are turned into sugars for fermentation of the “low wine” that is then distilled into whiskey) and five different yeasts thus allowing for ten combinations, and its single-barrel releases will carry an four-letter code that indentifies its particular mix.

O = Designates that the whiskey was produced at the Four Roses Distillery in Lawrenceburg
E = The mashbill consists of 75% corn, 25% rye and 5% malted barley
B = The mashbill consists of 60% corn, 35% rye, 5% malted barley
S = Designates straight whiskey distillation
V, K, O, Q and F = Identifies the yeast strain.

Our bottling was labeled “OESK Barrel #6” and bottled at barrel proof (59.9% ABV) after nearly twelve years of aging during which time its volume reduced through evaporation by nearly half. The result is an amazingly rich Bourbon with liqueur-like concentration and stunning complexity. It came with recommendations that it be cut with a bit of water, but in all truth it is as smooth as can be even when drunk neat. Now, I must admit such bottlings are very much in the realm of esoteric, but dyed-in-the-wool Bourbon devotees will revel in the details, and even the casual fan will immediately know that something special is going on in the glass. It is priced at $65.00 but is in my mind worth every dime.

As I mentioned earlier, this bottling selected by Ledger’s Liquors in Berkeley, and the folks at Ledger’s had the empty barrel on hand to make the point. The unassuming Ledger’s has been one of my favorite haunts when looking for the rare and unique spirits be it brandy or bourbon, tequila or rum, and I doubt that I have ever visited the place without finding an exciting new discovery. These people know what they are doing. It is worth a trip if you are a Bay Area resident, and, if touring from out of town, it belongs on the travel itinerary of all unrepentant aficionados of fine spirits.

Of final note, a new book on the history and people behind Four Roses entitled Four Roses: The Return of Whiskey Legend by distillery historian Al Young is set for December release, and you may well see a review here in the near future.

Ledger’s Liquors
1399 University Avenue Berkeley, CA 94702
(510) 540-9243
www.ledgersliquors.com

Satisfying Saturdays
GOTT’S ROADSIDE—Where Napa Insiders Grab A Burger

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

86 Gott’s Roadside 933 Main Street St. Helena California 94574 GOOD VALUE

There once was a drive-in restaurant on Highway 12 just south of St. Helena proper called Taylor’s Refresher.

The Taylors operated there from 1949 until 1999 when the Gott brothers, of the winemaking family Gott, leased the location and transformed a somewhat ramshackle place with reasonable drive-in food into a somewhat ramshackle place with burgers that are worth a drive by themselves. The Gotts also added a broader range of dishes, soups and high-falutin’ fast food like ahi tuna poke tacos and cobb salads to go along with the nine choices of burgers.

Yes, folks, our favorite luncheon place in the Napa Valley is a drive-in, although the carhops are long gone, that specializes in great burgers and classic milk shakes, French fries and onion rings, and has a wine list.

Don’t go looking for a glass of Zinfandel at your local Dairy Queen or Foster Freeze. The prices are not inexpensive for a burger joint and you have to sit outside or eat in your car, but if the sun is shining, even in winter when the temperature may not break 60 degrees and you need a coat, Gotts (still known as Taylors to the old-timers) is where you can rub elbows with winemakers and cellar hands, winery presidents and tourists of every stripe. And it the place where I have had more lunches than the rest of the Napa Valley’s famous restaurants combined.

There are now also outlets at the Oxbow Market in downtown Napa city and in San Francisco at the Ferry Building.

Gott's Roadside
933 Main Street
St. Helena, CA 94574
(707) 963-3486

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Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
A Week In Provence

Fri, 05 Nov 2010 00:01:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

What could be better than a week in Provence, that gorgeous garden spot of France? How about two weeks in Provence? Okay, so it was only twelve days but who’s counting? Dare I say it out loud? After regular trips to Paris over the last thirty years, Mrs. Olken and I have decided that the French countryside is a lot more inviting. And the most inviting location in that countryside is Provence, the area in the southern Rhône region whose wines are lusty, whose countryside is rich and rustic, whose cuisine is world class but not nearly so fussy at that found in Paris and whose sheer joy at living has attracted people for years upon years. We are not the first and we will not be the last to be drawn in by the beauty of Provence, but it is our favorite destination now and we are headed back this summer.

You see, the greatness of Provence is not measured in world-renowned cathedrals or in museums so grand that you don’t know whether to chase Picasso or Gauguin or to hang out at the Louvre with its antiquities and unrivalled Renaissance masterpieces or the Musee D’Orsay with its unrivalled collection of Impressionist art or the Pompidou Centre with its unmatched collections of modern art. The greatness of Provence is measured in what it does for your soul, how it makes you feel at one with the world, how its wines are so inviting to drink, its lavender fields so luxuriant that you want to stop at every one and take another picture, its artist colonies so comfortable and rewarding, its mountains and valleys straight out of an photographer’s lense, its little villages of Gigondas and Beaumes de Venise and Chateauneuf du Pape and Vaison-La Romaine so much more fun to navigate than Boulevard Saint-Michel or the Champs Elysees (no matter how beautiful it is at first glance).

With Provence looming again for us next summer, and the lessons of past trips still in our minds, it is perhaps time to share with you some of our secrets. If they are not new to you, they might nevertheless help frame a future trip of your own. And they apply to almost any wine country destination if you choose to go, as we now do, for holiday as well as winetrekking. You can do the same kind of planning for Tuscany, for the Veneto, for Burgundy.

For us, the starting point, after deciding when to go, of course, is finding a place to stay. And by that, we don’t mean a hotel but an apartment or house to call our own. Provence is simply loaded with short-term rental properties. Do an Internet search and you will find yourself overloaded with choices. Prices will range from not much more than $100 per night for a clean, neighborhood, self-catering apartment to several hundred for houses with pools, yards and wonderful views. The magnificent places can be found for less than the cost of a modest Left Bank hotel in Paris. We always make plans to visit a few wineries and there are two approaches to this. We sometimes make appointments, such as our recent visit to Vieux Telegraphe in Chateauneuf du Pape, but we also will drop in on places that offer tastings or discover wines in a local bistro and go in search of the producer. The results can be wonderful or exasperating when doing that, which is why we always have a couple of appointments arranged in advance.

One event that left us practically speechless was the Sunday market at Isle de la Sorgue. This Venice-like, water-involved place is a quiet antiquing center during the week but comes alive with hundreds and hundreds of stalls on the weekend with everything from a half-dozen flavors of hot chicken wings to be eaten on the spot to crafts of all kinds to antiques by the row. If outdoor markets are your thing, Isle de la Sorgue’s Sunday get-together is the granddaddy of the genre. Later in the week, while searching for a potter whose crafts we knew but whose location was “somewhere in the hills”, we came across a different kind of market. This was no “fancy, let’s invite the tourists in event”. This was a real market in the center of Nyon and the range of foods there, all meant to take home, rivaled almost anything you could find in, Les Halles, the giant and rightfully famous markethall of Lyon—more kinds of olives and varieties of tapenades than we have ever seen anywhere, dried salamis of every shape, size and seasoning, dried spices, and, yes, the same hot chicken wings wagon that provided our mid-day snack at Isle de la Sorgue.

We avoided most of the cities last time, but it is time to get into Avignon, in part because it turns out that our potter friend also has a shop there, and this time we will stay a bit further south, on the other side of Mont Ventoux, somewhere towards Aix-en-Provence. Our needs are simple. A nice, quiet house with a deck or backyard, a grill of some sort so we can pick up local produce and cook outdoors—summers in Provence need to be taken out of doors, a good boulangerie and a café for sitting around when we are not sitting around in our home away from home. And all of these things are available in virtually any town larger than a couple of hundred people. On our last trip, we even found a temporary summer restaurant run out of the local community center by a couple of enterprising culinary students.

Provence is magical. Like all places, it requires you to do some homework to find the right place to stay and to figure out what side trips you are going to take. You can spend your time immersed in wine, because every village has its own products, some with names you will recognize, others that you may read about in books, and some whose wines are just everyday stuff made young and intended to wash dinner down without the ceremony that accompanies the fancy names. Or you can do as we do and mix up the wining with the wandering.

Vintage Report

Fri, 05 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Sent by John Kelly, Westwood Winery, http://www.winemakernotesblog.com

Editor’s Note: The following report was posted late last night on the entry from Monday, Be Careful What You Wish For. It has been copied and entered here because it is an “honest” appraisal by a very open and honest winemaker.

Quick report on the view from inside the bubble: this vintage has presented conditions and challenges unprecedented in my 24 years. Guys at it longer than I have been are saying the same. Never have I experienced a year where sheer dumb luck has played more of a role in separating success from failure. I was lucky that our crop did not set to heavy, and that I had not thinned or pulled leaves when the sunburn hit. We were as careful as always about when we sulfured, but so were many of my friends and it's just dumb luck that we had no mildew and now have no rot in the fruit we still have out there. And it's just dumb luck that we have had indian summer in November (for crying out loud) and that it looks like we will get another ridge of high pressure for above normal temps and dry conditions next week.

As I've said before elsewhere, luck or no luck this year will separate the talented and prepared form the less so. There are some really GREAT wines being made, and some that are not so. Some of the latter are by choice. I spoke with a friend today who has a grower offering him some Grenache at a stoopid-low price. Well, it would be stoopid-low in a normal year but this stuff is not just et up with Botrytis but has a lot of Aspergillis and Pennicilium - harder to pick around ans sort out. So here's the plan: pick, ferment whole-cluster so you don't turn everything into mush right away, inoculate with a fast-starting yeast (where normally this guy would wait for a natural ferment), do minimal punchdowns, drain at the first negative Brix reading - do not press. Treat the wine wiht 30g/hL decolorizing carbon to pull out the bitterness and ochratoxin form the molds, then rack onto some sweet, dark Petite Sirah skins to claw back some color and character. I'm betting this turns out a tasty wine - and cheap too. Anyhoo - that's the kind of winemaking we are faced wiht at this point. Oh... wait... I'm not faced with that. Picking Mourvedre tomorrow and it is awesome - not going to make a "European-style" wine at all, any more than the Pinot, Syrah and Tannat I have picked so far will. Acids are lower and pH higher than anywone would have expected given the cool year. Go figure.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
All The News That’s Fit To Spit

Thu, 04 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Here we are. Just days after the San Francisco Giants, a team of rookies, misfits, castoffs and never wozzers won the World Series-- and barely a day after the political season of 2010 has thankfully ended and followed it into the history books. You would think that after all that, the silly season had gone away and left us with little to contemplate beyond how much damage the strange weather in wine country this year has done to the quality of the wine. Well, it is time to think again because the wine business is sort of like Hollywood. It just keeps on giving and giving and giving.

Today’s report card leaves us gasping for breath. Rather than being treated to a three-run homer, the wine world has been treated to a series of wild pitches in the last few days, and it is our solemn duty to bring them to you, to examine their viscera and to spit them out faster than if they were Two-Buck Chuck. It is time for All The News That’s Fit To Spit—so hang on tight boys and girls because the ride might just get a little rough.

ITEM: New Zealand Wine First In World To Come With Carbon Footprint Label

A New Zealand wine has become the first in the world to display the carbon footprint of each individual glass serving on its label – laying bare to the shopper or drinker the full environmental impact of making and transporting it. On the new label the relevant emissions, which are calculated to reflect the environmental impact of factors such as transportation and refrigeration, will be measured separately for every export market. So bottles sold in New Zealand, for example, will carry a figure of 140g CO2, whereas bottles shipped to Australia will display 190g. A higher figure is due to be calculated for the UK market which will reflect the huge distance involved in shipping the wines there.

The Report Card Grade: D. It is not enough that that anti-alcohol forces want every bottle to carry multiple warnings, now we have to get used to measuring our pleasure by its carbon footprint. Sorry, boys, we love the planet and all, but the carbon footprint of a glass of wine according to most estimates in about equal to a trip to the grocery store.

ITEM: NBC Drawn To Power Of ‘Vines’

NBC is planning a supernatural prime time soap opera, “Vines,” set in the Napa Valley, according to Curt King, senior vice president at Universal Media Studios. NBC bought the script last week. The show, which has yet to be made into a pilot, follows a troubled family who buy a Napa Valley vineyard in hopes of a fresh start. Little do they know their “ancient vines possess dangerous mystical powers”. Some in the Napa Valley are worried about the show giving the vines a bad reputation, but leading Napa winegrower, Andy Beckstoffer commented, “Say whatever you like about the vines, as long as you mention me.”

The Report Card Grade: F. Maybe they are planning to shoot it at Screaming Eagle. In the famous words of Bill The Cat, “Aaack Pffft” !!

ITEM: Japanese Wineries Betting on a Reviled Grape

From the New York Times article by Corie Brown.

“THE Japanese have made wine for years; it is just that no one outside Japan wanted to drink it, particularly if it was sweet swill made from a native table grape called koshu. But Ernest Singer thinks koshu deserves a place among the world’s fine white-wine grapes.

Mr. Singer, a wine importer based in Tokyo, said koshu captured his imagination nearly a decade ago when he tasted an experimental dry white wine made from the grape. Light and crisp with subtle citrus flavors, it was a match for Japan’s cuisine, he said, and could become the first Asian wine to draw international recognition. “We have shown you can make real wine in Japan,” Mr. Singer said. The question remains, he said, whether established vintners will change their winemaking practices or “continue to sell their schlock”.

The Report Card Grade: A/C-. One cannot help but be interested in this story with such a brilliant title. Way to go New York Times.

Give Ms Brown an “A” for calling swill by its first name, and give Mr. Singer an “A” for calling schlock by its own name. But the notion that Japan should build a home-grown wine industry on something light and citrusy at best and schlock at worst deserves at best a “C-“ for effort. The parallel would be California making grapes out of Concord or whatever it was that was growing here two hundred years ago. Making love to native varieties is all well and good, but they need to have a reason for being chosen beyond their mere existence.

Wine And Food Wednesday
Is Anyone Paying Attention?

Wed, 03 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We usually reserve our rants for Monday, but I doubt that I can contain myself for another week. I worry that my angst will diminish, and I really do not want to succumb to libertarian notions that gastronomic beauty is solely in the eye of the beholder. Maybe, it is that I just cast my ballot in this year’s election, and I am feeling queasy about political puffery claiming that knowledge, experience and expertise are vastly overrated. Today, as it turns out, I am feeling rather reactionary about rules and standards and definitions of beauty. Yes, I still cannot and will not dispute the notion that whatever food and wine combination that excites is just fine, and I would never tell an individual that he or she is wrong, but when bizarre and unpleasant food and wine pairings are professionally pushed, then I shake my head and wonder.

I suppose, first and foremost, the popular press sometimes leaves me baffled and even a bit angry, and, yes Samantha, Food and Wine Magazine’s recommendation of Syrah as a dandy Thanksgiving drink did help trigger these thoughts. Syrah and turkey? Not on my table. Maybe Syrah teams up well with those canned sweet potatoes hiding beneath a blanket of melted marshmallows. I wouldn’t know. Samantha, I do not receive said publication, but after reading your rant, I just might so I can have the satisfaction of subsequently canceling my subscription. The point is not that the writer in question is wrong for liking this food and wine “match”, but that they are recommending it to a very large audience and should know better than to believe that most diners would agree. A professional journalist, I think, has some responsibility for knowing to whom they are speaking and understanding what are, at least, the general outlines of something we might call the “physiology of human taste”.

The lack of the latter is also painfully obvious in professional venues where you would think sensibilities might especially heightened, and, dear readers, you would be truly surprised at some of the perfectly dreadful wine dinners that we endure. Most recently, in fact, and the true genesis of these musings, we attended a gala gathering at a Napa Valley winery and were served a 25-year-old Cabernet as a first-course accompaniment to a cauliflower and brussel-sprout salad bathed in a grapefruit dressing!?!? Then Cabernets from the early to mid 1990s were brought out as a foil to seared sea bass and spaghetti squash. Folks, such pairings are beyond creative and avant garde and into the realm of cluelessness. By the time the lamb course arrived, my palate was dry as dust, my fondness for Cabernet was gone for the night and utter befuddlement had replaced hunger.

I guess that the point of my semi-cathartic ramblings today is to reiterate the notion that a few simple tried-and-true guidelines go a long way in making mealtimes more pleasurable, and, as I constantly remind my culinary students, do not worry that something might be wrong with you when a “professional” comes up with a food-and-wine pairing so discordant that you wonder as to just what and if they were thinking.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Dear Food & Wine: You Suck

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The blog as artform can take many shapes. It is nothing more and nothing less than someone’s ramblings, and whether those ramblings are smart and informative, informational and instructive or personal and introspective, blogs are expressions of the people who write them. Even this blog, which is intended to be more of a content-driven daily magazine of sorts, is a reflection of the people who write it. It matters not whether you are reading our restaurant reviews (which, as you have noticed, are of restaurants we like, and thus you are learning what types of restaurants inspire us) or product reviews like Steve Eliot’s takes on liquors and liqueurs, and thus you learn that Steve is omnibibulous and endlessly curious, you learn something about him every time he writes. I’m not sure what you learn about me except that I like a good argument, pro or con, and it matters not whether I am in the middle of it or watching from the sideline. Give me a cogent, well-thought out bit of argy-bargy and I am all in.

Today’s “Best Of” somehow manages to cover all the bases that a blog can cover. It is brilliantly analytical. It is revealing of its author. It is personal. It is instructive. It has moved people to applause as the many, many comments about it reveal, and it has moved people to action. It is written by a woman, Samantha Dugan, whose wine blog voice, indeed, whose writing voice, is unique, involving, inviting. No other wine blog is as personal, touching, giving, revealing as Samantha Sans Dosage. It never wins awards for the best writing about wine in the blogosphere, but it certainly ought to win awards for the best writing in the wine blogosphere. It makes the rest of us look like cub reporters by comparison.

Take her blog, penned last Tuesday, and read by me at least every other day. It had me laughing out loud as Mrs. Olken was walking into my office yesterday. I sat her down and read it to her. She was laughing out loud. But, this is not a humorous entry, dear readers, this is a serious and seriously raucous rant about the follies of a magazine that has let the blogger down one too many times. It is compelling reading.

Here is how it starts. It needs reading all the way to the end, and a link is provided. And when you get there, go find Ms. Dugan’s entry that appeared this morning. It explains, far better than anyone else can, why the amazingly unique and compelling voice that is Samantha Sans Dosage has become required reading.

Dear Food & Wine Magazine,

You suck.

Sincerely,
Samantha Dugan

Truth is I have been bitching and moaning about this particular publication for a couple of years now, I think it was about the time I got one of their yearend issues and over half of it was advertisements or even worse, the “special advertisements” which is basically an ad that pretends not to be. Fucking annoying as hell. I will say that I do find the recipes in Food & Wine some of the easiest to execute and for that reason alone I’ve not figured out how to get my goddamn American Express to quit renewing my subscription but I think after this latest craptastic issue I am going to have to call it quits. The wine articles in this glossy rag that proudly boasts wine as half its name are simply dreadful, always have been. They used to just be boring and redundant…I mean whole articles dedicated to steakhouse wine lists... lemme guess, big reds? What the hot new sommeliers are favoring in place of Gruner these days and endless articles about what wines to bring to all those swanky dinner parties or (a personal favorite) perfume and wine, as in “this Barolo reminds me of Chanel” or whatever. Trite and never all that informative, that was the way I saw most of the wine articles in Food & Wine, (all one or two in each issue), before but the utter pile of crap that landed in my mailbox this month had me not only saying aloud, “Oh shut up” but slapping the slippery pages of stupid down on the smashed beige carpet of my living room floor.

This rant has barely begun. The fun really gets going at: http://sansdosage.blogspot.com/2010/10/im-quitting-you.html

Monday Manifestos
Be Careful What You Wish For

Mon, 01 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Halloween is over. The NFL season is half over. The World Series is four games over. And why is there baseball in November—not that I have much to complain about at this point. And the harvest is over, almost over or may never be over depending on whose reports and whose rumors one hears. Heavy rains north of San Francisco a week ago certainly spelled doom and gloom for everyone with grapes hanging, and it did not take much of an observer to find vineyard after vineyard along Highway 29 loaded with reds heavy on the vine. Much of what is out is Cabernet Sauvignon. One hears winery owners, winemakers and vintners of every stripe saying things like “the rains did not hurt the Cabernet” and “the quality of the tannins is a lot better after the rain”. It all sounds a little like wishful thinking to me. And it has become even more wishful after rains early in the weekend.

Still, we have seen November harvests before, most notably in 1998, and, despite early predictions of vinous disaster, that year produced more elegant wines than either of the more heralded 1997 and 1999 harvests. Of course, so much of what is reported and the ways in which vintages are judged have been focused on and measured by Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. And so much of what we hear now is similarly cast. But California is no longer a one-grape, one-appellation wine place. And if there are problems with some late varieties and some very cold places, there are lots of other combinations out there that will have come good in terms of long hang times and picking numbers. And there are even a fair number of Cabernet vineyards that will have been picked before the heavy rains.

Okay, so that’s the good news and the bad news. But, beware. Every time we have a vintage like this with longer maturations, higher acidities and lower sugars at picking (which translates into lower alcohol wines than normal), the cry of “European-style” vintage is heard. We heard it in 1975, we heard it again in 1985 and you can bet we are going to hear it again this year, especially for the early-ripening varieties and for all kinds of wines from south of the Bay where the year was cooler than normal but not so extraordinarily cool and the rains have not hit so hard as up north. We heard it also in 2007, a vintage with fewer extremes and almost no problems.

But this time, the results are not so assured, and partly because we know that cool harvests lead not only to wines of a more restrained style, but also sometimes to wines that are simply restrained. The much-praised harvest of 1985 was one such year in which too many wines matured with less “heart” than almost any prognosticator prognosticated. In 2007, the results were spectacularly more successful, and although the final chapters are far from being in for the late-to-market heavy reds, so far everything from Chardonnay to Cabernet has looked great. And, of course, the other reason why 2010 is different, at least in the North Coast, is that too many vines simply refused to ripen. There will ultimately be a lot of vineyards not picked, and there will be vineyards in less than optimal shape picked because some wine is better than none when a winery has a mortgage to pay off.

South of the Bay, things look almost normal by comparison. It is still too early to judge intensity, but well-managed vineyards should have been able to bring in balanced grapes without excessive ripeness. And wineries generally have issued good to excited reports. Yes, it is November, and November reports are notoriously optimistic. And reports of a wished-for “European vintage” may well come true. But before we all get too excited, please remember 1985 and 1975 and recall the old adage—“Be careful what you wish for”. Lighter vintages have not always worked out in the bottle the way we thought they would when the grapes were in the fermenter.

Sunday Serendipity
Les Domaines Grassa Reserve

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Although the several miles of Cabernet grapes we saw hanging a couple of days back along Napa Valley’s Highway 29 might suggest otherwise, it looks like winter may have finally arrived here in Northern California. It’s rainy and it’s cold and it’s turning out to be the kind of weekend that invites a crackling fire on the hearth and a late-evening glass of brandy. If fine Cognac ranks high on my list of favorite spirits, the somewhat warmer and more rustic brandies of its more southerly cousin, Armagnac, have always seemed to me just a bit better suited to pushing back the cold. Chateau du Tariquet, located in the region’s best appellation, Bas Armagnac, has been owned by the Grassa family for nearly one-hundred years and is among my top picks of the region. Moreover, I have yet to find as good an Armagnac at the price as the Chareau du Tariquet’s estate-grown and distilled Réserve, which can be found in the local San Francisco Bay Area market for under $35.00. It is a comparatively rich, slightly viscous, full-bodied brandy that, while displaying the region’s characteristic savoir and spice, is a little more polished and never quite so coarse as Armagnac can sometimes be. It is the kind of brandy that invokes contemplation as much as it does a smack of the lips, and it’s deep, toffee, burnt-almond and dried apricot qualities make for a remarkably flavorful and genuinely complex mix.

It is worth noting that Yves Grassa, family patriarch and very much the individual that put Chateau du Tariquet on the international map, is a thoroughly modern, UC Davis-trained enologist who very successfully expanded family endeavors into winemaking back in the 1980s, and, I suspect, he might have a few words to say about our ongoing Blog discussions about wine and “authenticity”. “I didn’t start with any prejudices,” he has said. “France is not my only culture, and I think sometimes tradition can become nothing more than a habit.” And, his Tariquet marketing director has been quoted by Michael Sanders in the NYTimes as saying “terroir doesn’t interest us all that much…what the winemaker does, that’s the most important.” Hmm, more grist for the mill to be sure, but, if the proof lies in the pudding or in this instance the glass, M. Grassa earns a big thumbs-up for his brandy.

Satisfying Saturdays
Sausalito’s Poggio—A Great Trattoria

Sat, 30 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

90 POGGIO RISTORANTE 777 Bridgeway Sausalito, California 94965 (415) 332-7771
http://www.poggiotrattoria.com

By Stephen Eliot

So many wines, so many restaurants, so little time. We confess that what we do for a living is not an unbearable grind and that we do, in fact, revel in discovery, but sometimes the moment calls for something comfortable and familiar and certain to please. In truth, we do not find ourselves making repeat visits to many restaurants even when we are impressed with the food, but there is a special small handful that we return to again and again. Last Saturday, Charlie introduced one of our favorites, Oakland’s Bay Wolfe Restaurant, and I have the same personal, almost-proprietary feel about Sausalito’s Poggio Trattori.

Now, Poggio requires a bit of a drive across a bridge or two for us East Bay folks, but the rewards far outweigh any effort such commute may entail. Inspired by the rustic cuisine of Northern Italy and headed by the passionate and very talented Chef Peter McNee, Poggio turns out a constantly changing menu of innovative, deeply flavorful dishes that, while never fussy or precious, are about as interesting and genuinely soul-satisfying as trattoria food is likely to get. While invoking the usual “seasonal”, “locally produced” mantras that seem almost mandatory of Bay Area chefs, the menu at Poggio simply goes several steps further and transcends typical Italian fare as translated by an American kitchen.

Outstanding recent offerings include oak-grilled lamb tongue with beets , horseradish and soft-cooked egg; goat head stew with calabrian chile, chickpeas and semolina gnocchi; Littleneck clams with pork belly confit, butter beans, peperonata; Whole wheat fettuccelle, sardines, castelvetrano olives, breadcrumbs; and braised lamb neck ragu with polenta filled pasta, english peas, mint…and, well, you get the idea. Of special note, Poggio periodically features special multi-day events such as a celebration of Bolitto Misto that takes simply boiled meats to new heights, and, every Fall, the Festa del Tartufo, or festival of white truffles is absolutely not to be missed. This year, the 7th annual Festa runs from November 9 to November 13, and we will be there.

The place is roomy and open and never so noisy that conversation becomes a challenge, and in warm weather it front façade opens to sidewalk dining. The wine list is extensive, well chosen and reasonably priced. It is on the San Francisco Chronicle’s list of Top 100 Bay Area Restaurants, and it is on my short list of places to eat when I do not want to think but only want to be feel good.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Travels With Charlie

Fri, 29 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I have had a few tricks up my sleeve this week, and more are coming next week. They add up to destinations today, next week and next year.

Today: At 7:30. Vintage Berkeley, Elmwood store. A book signing of our new book, the Connoisseurs’ Guidebook to California Wines and Wineries, co-sponsored by Mrs. Dalloway’s, a fabulous independent bookstore also in Berkeley’s Elmwood District. My co-author, Joe Furstenthal and I will be there signing books and drinking wine. Join us.

Next Friday, November 5: 4:30-7:00. The Ferry Plaza Wine Merchant is sponsoring a tasting with 30 Napa Valley wineries. At the Ferry Building but upstairs out of the hustle and bustle of the main floor at the Ferry Building. Have a look at the wineries that will be pouring. This is a very special event. And discount tickets are available through the website:

http://www.fpwm.com/wine_bar/event2.html.

I just talked to Debbie, the co-proprietor of The Ferry Plaza Wine Merchant and got permission to extend my insider membership in their “club” to our readers. Use the word “Club” when you sign up and you can attend this awesome event for the insider’s price of $35 instead of the regular $50. Tell Debbie that Charlie sent you.

For the future: Raymond Vineyards. The Raymond family were involved in the running of the fabled Beringer winery through marriage, and when Beringer was bought up by outside interests, the Raymonds, Roy and Walt, started a new winery right in the heart of the Napa Valley just south of Zinfandel Lane. It is a privileged location, and, over the years, has made some very good wines and, frankly, some wines that were not all that well-received by Connoisseurs’ Guide. About a year ago, Jean-Charles Boisset, son of the owner of the Burgundian house that owns among other things, Clos Vougeot, purchased Raymond and he has set out to change the practices at the winery and to change the image of the winery. I was up there last night for the unveiling of the winery’s “Crystal Room”, which is a tasting bar and small wine library set up smack in the middle of the winery’s tanks. For now, the rest of the building is unchanged, but will be fancied up, and the viticultural move to organic and biodynamic farming, complete with walkaround, outdoor explanations of what, how and even a look at the raising of the insects and animals involved is in progress. This is a destination to keep in mind. The wines are on the upswing and so is the visiting experience.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
AUTHENTICITY—PART THREE

Thu, 28 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

GRADE: B-

I went to a college where the grading was pretty tough. If you averaged a “B”, you made Dean’s List and would graduate with honors. A “B-“ was a pretty good grade because the answer to the question, what did you get in English Lit or Economics or Science for Dummies (not called that, but that was what it was) could be “B” and you would not even have to confess to the minus at the end. But there was another grade to which some of us were addicted. It was “C+” and was known as “the gentleman’s C” because it meant you were close to being able to say you got a B.

Well, that is how I feel about the authenticity debate. As smart as all of us are who entered into the quick firestorm over this latest buzz word, we really never laid a glove on each other’s arguments because we never established the ground rules. Who is it that definitively establishes the parameters of authenticity? Are they static or do they change? Does authenticity get defined by European tradition and the rest of the world is left to imitate or fester in a pool of failure to be “authentic”? Where does terroir enter into the picture? Global warming? Technological advances?

My writing partner, Steve Eliot, also teaches wine education at the California Culinary Academy. His unique take on the world of interventionist winemaking is instructive. One of these days, he will elaborate because this topic is simply not going to go away. Steve points out that the would-be chefs at his institution of learning are taught every tactic, trick and culinary maneuver that can be crammed into them all for one overriding purpose—to be able to cook more interesting food. Why then, he wonders, would winemakers be expected to ignore the tools available to them. Our tasting panel member, winemaker Matt Smith (his winery is Blacksmith and he also consults to several wineries including Rock Wall) is more direct. “My job”, Matt says, “is to make wine that tastes good within the style that I want to make. I don’t use every shortcut available, but why would I avoid things that help? Does Alice Waters ignore spices, brining, sous vide”?

Authenticity may be a useful concept, but not to me. I much more prefer notions of varietal consistency, commonality of character found in a given location, the use of oak when it helps, balance, cleanliness and the ability to taste good with food. I cannot see how authenticity fits into any of those concepts directly. Thus, the good but not perfect grades to all of us who have participated intelligently in a debate that ultimately has not provided us any new understandings of the world.

WINE NEWS OF THE DAY

My winewriting colleague Laurie Daniels, writing in the San Jose Mercury-News, has penned a column called “On Wine: What Is Purity?”

I was buzzing around the Internet, having just wrapped up the article above, looking for interesting news items such as the report that sixty producers of Muscadet in France have gone bankrupt. Alder Yarrow’s blog, Vinography got there before me, so I won’t go far down that path except to remind everyone that wine is an agricultural commodity and this year’s scarcity is next year’s surplus.

Laurie’s column asks some good questions, goes too far for my taste in ignoring the usefulness of the winemaking tools that are discussed above, and then, just as I am scratching my head wondering if “natural” wine is not another synonym is some people’s minds for authenticity, she concludes with this—“But I do object to wines that profess purity and then, as part of a recipe, are tweaked and sculpted year in and year out to fit some sort of predetermined style. These aren't wines that reflect a unique site; sometimes they don't even reflect the typicity of a particular grape variety. They have more in common with people addicted to plastic surgery: They chase an ideal, but are utterly lacking in authenticity.“

I told you this discussion was not over.

Wine And Food Wednesday
Duck Tacos and Pinot Noir

Wed, 27 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It is so tried and true that it has become the stuff of cliché, but the mealtime matching of Pinot Noir and duck is about as delicious as any cliché is likely to get, and it does not matter whether we are talking about roast duck, grilled duck, seared duck, duck in sauces or duck confit, I am already halfway to cellar with a clear mission in mind. Perhaps it is because I have a case of Pinot Noir on the brain after tasting though scores of very good wines for the new October CGCW issue, or perhaps the blame lies with Charlie for his Saturday homage to Oakland’s Bay Wolfe Restaurant and recollections of the countless outstanding duck dinners that we have enjoyed from Chef Michael Wild, but, whatever the reason, the craving for duck and a good glass of Pinot is getting hard to suppress. Now, I suppose that I could head out on the town this weekend in search of a much-needed gastronomic fix, but as I mull over my choices, I remember a particularly satisfying recipe, one that I have not prepared in a while, and Friday dinner at home has suddenly become that carrot that will get me through the week.

Mu Shu Roast Duck and Vegetable Tacos by San Francisco Chronicle food and wine writer Lynne Char Bennett was conceived as, in her words, a “fun first course” to accompany Pinot Noir. When we make it, however, we often never get to a second. We can only say thank you, Lynne; it is that good, and it is better yet when accompanied by a fruity, well-ripened California Pinot Noir. Ideally, the recipe wants pairing with a Pinot of some size and richness rather than one of a lighter, more elegant bent. We have found a number of bottlings from the Santa Lucia Highlands to be especially successful, and, while there might be temptation to dismiss the dish as being “just tacos”, please know that it has plenty of depth and complexity with regards to both flavor and texture. It might be “just tacos” to some, but we have made the dish more than once and can say from experience that it is a recipe that easily leads us to opening one of those special-occasion DuMol, Dehlinger, Merry Edwards, Williams Selyem or Kosta-Browne bottles that we have squirreled away.

The recipe is available at SFGate.com and can by following this link. http://www.sfgate.com/food/recipes/detail.html?p=detail&rid=15671&sorig=qs

Here are recommendations for a few recently tasted Pinots whose price tags make them more useful in an every day setting.

87 BEAULIEU Pinot Noir Carneros 2008 $17.00 GOOD VALUE
Here is an easy and honest Pinot that counts fine varietal focus as its greatest asset, and, if never dramatic or particularly complex, it gets things right in terms of keen cherry-like fruit. It is plump and fleshy in feel, and it is free of any youthful coarseness. It is ready to go even now, but should hold up for a few years, and it is made all the more attractive by its modest price.

86 HAHN Pinot Noir Monterey 2008 $12.00 GOOD VALUE
We have been consistently impressed with the value afforded by Hahn's inexpensive bottlings of late, and this very solid, well-ripened Pinot does not disappoint. It marries plenty of cherries with lots of sweet, crème brûlée oak, and if a touch tannic and lacking real finesse, it is a flavorful, nicely stuffed effort that is hard to beat at anything approaching the price.

91 MACMURRAY Pinot Noir Russian River Valley 2008 $35.00
Nicely stated red cherry fruit with touches of black cherries and a bright, energetic, not quite developed side makes the early going in this somewhat supple, slightly flesh, never soft bottling. Young in its fruit with good volume to its cherryish flavors and plenty of depth to hold off somewhat coarse tannins at this writing, the wine seems bound to improve for three to six years and is more likely to fit in with savory beef dishes than with something on the more refined side.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
AUTHENTICITY—PART TWO

Tue, 26 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Oliver Styles is an Englishman turned Spanish winemaker who writes an incredibly entertaining blog by the name of wine-life.co.uk, which, of course, is also its web address (www.wine-life.co.uk). Smart boy, that Olly. In an earlier entry, which I just discovered in tracking down Mr. Styles’ comments on authenticity, he offers us a humorous dismembering of a wine advocate under the title, “Where Have You Gone, Robert Parker”. No matter that Mr. Styles is just the latest in a long line of folks who have piled on Mr. Parker this year in what has become the wine blogosphere’s favorite parlor game, the points he makes about what Parker has become over the years are close enough to the truth, and profound enough to be worth reading—even if this kind of stuff does not amuse.

But we are not here to congratulate Mr. Styles for bashing Mr. Parker. No, that is a game for another day. Today, we are honoring Mr. Styles for bashing Matt Kramer and his notions of authenticity. And, while Mr. Styles does not go half far enough in his explorations of authenticity, a shortcoming we intend to address later in the week when we discuss how all these wine buzz words fit together, he does a pretty good job of explaining why authenticity is, as Steve Heimoff called it in his yesterday’s comment, the wine writer’s equivalent of biodynamicism as a marketing idea rather than a way of life.

Below, I quote his key paragraph. Go read the rest of it on his website.

“Surely ‘authenticity’ is a construct. We Just as claret had an authentic stamp for the English wine merchant 50 years ago, authentic (in other words, ‘top’) Bordeaux has a different authenticity now. Indeed, many of the machines Kramer points to as not being authentic in winemaking terms (reverse osmosis, spinning cones) are easily found in some of the world’s top wine estates – I know that a top Bordeaux Second Growth owned (still does?) an evaporation machine for concentrating juice. If one wishes to be pedantic – and one does – a crusher/destemmer, the ubiquitous machine in wineries worldwide, is not authentic winery equipment because originally, grapes would not have been destemmed (peasants don’t have time for that kind of thing).”

And considering his wit on the one hand and common sense on the other, you now know why I am so delighted to have found my way to Mr. Styles’ blog.

Monday Manifestos
The Latest Wine Buzz Word: AUTHENTICITY
--It’s déjà vu all over again

Mon, 25 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

PART ONE
If one looks up the phrase, “We’ve seen this movie before”, it turns out to be used hundreds of times just in the last few years to dismiss everything from global warming to trickle-down economics. It says, in one breath, “your idea is not new so we don’t need it”. Yogi Berra, that great American philosopher, said it this way, “It’s déjà vu all over again.”

We have just seen “déjà vu” in the world of wine words. Perhaps it has always been thus. The latest creation is “Authenticity”, a concept that it as old as wine but has surfaced as the “explanation” as the driving force in the wine world over the last several decades. It is a concept propounded by none other than Matt Kramer, author of several very good wine books and columnist in the Wine Spectator. And for his sins in making such a proclamation, Mr. Kramer has started a fire storm of debate about what is and what is not authentic and a second fire storm about whether he is even correct in what he says.

Connoisseurs’ Guide is going to explore the several sides of this debate in the coming days and weeks. It is not an idea that can be either accepted or dismissed with a simple wave of the hand—the way we sometimes do with other buzz words like Biodynamics or Parkerization or The Sideways Effect. Those notions, some more difficult to understand than others, seem to inspire immediate admiration or immediate disdain. AUTHENTICITY has a larger place in our universe because it is neither right nor wrong but plays on both sides of the fence.

When Mr. Kramer says, “In the past 20 years—and especially in the past decade—what has really driven the changes in wines is the issue of authenticity”, he winds up trying to sum up complexity with simplicity. Steve Heimoff in his eponymous blog, to which I am addicted by the way, takes total issue with Kramer and says “if you were to ask me what the change has been in the last forty years, I would say it’s been in the direction of richer and riper wines” and “can anyone seriously question the fact that that trend accelerated hugely throughout the 1980s and 1990s, and that Parker and the Wine Spectator fueled it?” Of course, Heimoff is essentially arguing that the 100-point system is really the deus ex machina in this play.

Kramer’s column in the Spectator has led to a discussion lasting almost a week now and covering some fifty comments. The Siduri winery’s Adam Lee has led the charge with his questions about where “authenticity” begins and ends.

Heimoff’s column, appearing at the end of last week, has generated an additional forty comments, although, truth be told, it was Heimoff’s reference to the 100-point system that was at the heart of the debate. Questions about authenticity soon got lost.

But now they are back, and I would refer you to a column in the English-based blog, wine-life.co.uk (http://wine-life.co.uk/news-review/authenticity-parker-and-100-points) for yet another view of the world of authenticity.

For today, I would like to leave you with several key thoughts—and the promise to be back with more on this topic tomorrow.

Whenever anyone tries to put a simple tag on a complex and changing situation—as the world of fine wine is now and has been forever, they are bound to miss the whole point. Matt Kramer is not wrong; Steve Heimoff is not wrong. They just are trying to simplify the complex, and that makes them only partly correct.
We have seen this movie before. In past years, significant change on the wine world stage has been ascribed to geographic codification (AOC, AVA etc), global warming, creeping Peynaudism, terroir and several dozen other concepts that have come and gone. Some have had more impact than others, and some have been nothing more than notions that have cropped up without a scintilla of usefulness (does anyone remember the “food wine” movement of the early 1980s, because if not, we are destined to repeat it in the future under some silly guise or other including “authenticity”). No matter that Yogi was right about déjà vu, the search for answers to dark and disturbing questions will continue. And Connoisseurs’ Guide will be back tomorrow with the flashlight.

Sunday Serendipity
The Bourbon Revolution

Sun, 24 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

I remember my first introduction to Single-Malt Scotch Whisky a good many decades ago. It was one of those genuinely eye-opening moments of discovery, and, over the subsequent years, I sipped and scribbled countless notes and found myself as enraptured with the complexities of the stuff almost as much as I was with fine wines. Bourbon and other American whiskeys, however, were in that era about as interesting as jug wines, and even though I recall the late Senator Barry Goldwater once commenting dreamy-eyed that then-President Richard Nixon had the “best damned Bourbon” he ever tasted, I never met one with which making an acquaintance was worthwhile - and I would like to believe that Republican politics was not a prerequisite to its enjoyment.

Well, as any fan of fine spirits knows very well, the world is a far different place now, and, in recent years, there has been as awakening in interest in fine American whiskey, Bourbon included, and there are myriad offerings of splendid, deeply-flavored, wonderfully involving examples to be had. Some regard Bourbon’s rise to respectability as a “renaissance “, but I am not sure that there is any golden age in the past that can lay claim to inspiring the new generation of new American whiskeys, but rather that there is a new, unprecedented demand for fine Bourbon quite unlike what has ever existed and that master distillers have finally found an audience and thus a market for what they do best. “Revolution”, it seems to me, would be the better word.

Among my personal heroes when talking about Bourbon, the father-son team of Parker and Craig Beam at Heaven Hill Distillery in Bardstown, Kentucky make some of the finest examples of this patently American tipple to be had. Their best, as is typically the case with other accomplished Bourbon producers, are single-barrel bottlings that have been given lengthy aging and individually selected for bottling. Their Elijah Craig 18 Year Old Single Barrel ranks among those Bourbons that I reserve for very special occasions (or particularly difficult days), but today I would like to give a special nod to their Vintage 2000 Single-Barrel offering under the Evan Williams label. Its combination of complexity, concentration, enveloping smoothness and remarkable balance adds up to the kind of late-evening sipper that, much like the most memorable wines, is the catalyst to contemplation and imagination, and its $26.00 price tag makes it an indulgence that comes without guilt. It is the kind of spirit that wants drinking neat, yet, when married in a three-to-one mix with Carpano Antica Vermouth and a couple of dashes of Fee Brothers Barrel-Aged Bitters, it will make a Manhattan that lifts a classic cocktail to new heights.

Satisfying Saturdays
Urban Wineries: An Urban Restaurant: The Bay Wolf

Sat, 23 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

91 Bay Wolf 3853 Piedmont Avenue Oakland California 94611 510-655-6004 www.baywolf.com

Sometimes you don’t have to go far from home to find a winery to visit. Here in Alameda, in the San Francisco Bay Area’s East Bay, where I live, there are about a dozen wineries, the most famous, of course, is Rosenblum Cellars founded by local veterinarian and then award-winning home winemaker, Kent Rosenblum. The winery was sold to conglomerate Diageo a few years ago but still maintains a tasting room at the facility. Its view of water, bridges and downtown San Francisco has seen the Olkens wandering over a late Saturday afternoon for a glass of red followed by something sweet to wash it all down and send us on our way. And Alameda is not alone in hosting urban wineries. The short swath of land from Oakland’s waterfront up to Emeryville and Berkeley has another dozen producers of note. Most of these small, independent producers belong to the East Bay Vintners Alliance (www.eastbayvintners.com/), and some like Dr. Rosenblum’s new venture, Rock Wall and Jeff Cohn’s JC Cellars have enjoyed great critical success. Most happily welcome visitors though not all are open all the time.

It really does not matter where one wanders in wine country before one constant ultimately rears its hungry head. Sooner or later, it is time to eat. The East Bay has many famous restaurants headed by Berkeley’s world-famous Chez Panisse. We do not often eat downstairs where the menu is expensive and the reservations are hard to come by. Upstairs in the Café, there are more seats, the prices are more accessible and the food is that unique combination that foodies out here call Cal-Med—a sort of downhome cooking featuring local ingredients with seasonings that are inspired by the countries lining the Mediterranean.

Our long-time favorite is the Bay Wolf on Oakland’s tony Piedmont Avenue. The Bay Wolf, overseen by Michael Wild, has been an East Bay gustatory institution for about 35 years. it has a constantly changing menu with no more than a dozen choices from start to finish, yet the Olkens, who generally do not like to go back to restaurants after a couple of visits because things get too predictable, have spent more birthdays, office parties, book-launching dinners and meals with visiting winemakers who like to stop by to show off their wares here than at any other restaurant. There are, however, two menu items that one can always expect and they are part of the Bay Wolf signature. The duck liver flan first course is a slice of rich, creamy duck liver worked with magic into a smooth and light paste that comes to you in a size slightly larger than a deck of cards. It is the perfect starter to be shared. And the other item is also duck. Duck prepared differently each time we go back but duck nonetheless. You have not eaten duck until you have a double-duck dinner at the Bay Wolf.

The wine list is a two page listing of hand chosen bottles from around the world, all sold at reasonable prices. Scherrer Old and Mature Vines Zinfandel 2005, three stars/95 points in Connoisseurs’ Guide, with a retail price of $30 sells on the Bay Wolf list for $40. That is twice wholesale and extremely fairly priced. The wine by the glass program features a dozen and a half wines.

There is a reason, folks, why the Bay Wolf is rated so highly by Zagat and was called one of the top ten restaurants in the Bay Area by Gourmet Magazine. And it is not because the Olkens eat there. We eat there because the experience is that good.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Six Hours In The Napa Valley

Fri, 22 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is a question one hears frequently. I have visitors from out of town and I want to take them to the Napa Valley for a day. Where should I go? With hundreds of wineries in Napa from which to choose, from large, well-organized to small and intimate, there are plenty of answers, and most of them are correct. It is hard to have a bad time in the Napa Valley because the scenery in attractive, the wineries are accessible and the restaurants are special. And then there is the wine. Even with the tremendous expansion of plantings from one end of California to the other in the last thirty or forty years, it is still the Napa Valley whose name speaks loudest when people want to visit here in wine country. Napa accounts for something like 40% of all touring dollars spent in California despite having only 10% of the wineries and 10% of the grapes.

Last night, at a book-signing event for just published The New Connoisseurs’ Guidebook to California Wines and Wineries (write to us via the CONTACT button above to get your autographed copy), the question was asked with a twist—a particular set of limitations, to wit. “I will have a group of high-powered clients traveling by limousine from San Francisco to the Napa Valley. We have lunch planned at noon at Bottega in Yountville (see our recommendation archived under Satisfying Saturdays in the Blog buttons to the right). And they would like to visit the J winery.”

Those two notions are, of course, mutually exclusive unless one wants to spend half the day riding around wine country instead of visiting wineries. Bottega is in the Napa Valley. J is in the Russian River Valley almost up to Healdsburg. “But, not to worry. A solution is at hand,” I explained.

You are leaving from San Francisco. Drive up Highway 101 and cross over towards Sonoma on Highway 37. Turn up towards Sonoma town, and drive across the Sonoma end of Carneros and then towards Napa.

Make your first stop at Domaine Carneros (http://domainecarneros.ewinerysolutions.com/index.cfm). Like our recommendation of Gloria Ferrer in an earlier blog entry, this sparkling very handsomely designed sparkling wine house sits in a privileged location looking out over the vines and has a very attractive visitors center. It is not J, but like J, it is a maker of very good bubbly and also features quite likeable Pinot Noir. After bubbly and hors d’ouevres, you can then run up to Yountville and Bottega, about twenty minutes away for lunch.

One reason to visit wine country is to learn about how wine is made, and no winery does a better job of organizing it tours and explanations than the Robert Mondavi winery in Oakville (http://www.robertmondavi.com/rmw/). Not only is it an attractive winery, but it knows how to put on a show from vineyard walks to the tour of its winemaking facilities to its tasting options when finished. It has been a stop that I have made with visiting family and college classmates on almost every occasion. And it never disappoints. The key to success is calling the winery and discussing what you want to do with them before you go. In this instance, with a giant limousine filled with a dozen visiting business executives, a private tour will get laid on. I suggested that they asked for one of the technical tours simply because there is more to be learned that way.

“OK”, my inquisitor said, “but all of that sounds a little corporate to me. How about a smaller winery to finish up”? We discussed options and she liked the notion of getting off the Valley floor and up into the hills. The place that suits my fancy in those situations is Pride Winery (www.pridewines.com). Perched at the very top of the Mayacamas Mountains and straddling the border between Napa and Sonoma Counties, Pride, like Domaine Carneros, is not just a very good winery but occupies a setting with plenty of eye-appeal. Its wines represent the fully stuffed end of the spectrum, but are typically quite well-balanced and, despite their tendencies to ripeness, do not lose themselves to overripeness. Their high recommendations in Connoisseurs’ Guide attest to their overall quality. And there is an even more compelling reason why I often choose to end one-day visits to Napa at Pride. With all the driving and eating and tasting, I like the last stop of the day to be relaxed. Standing at the very top of the Napa Valley, looking out over the rolling vineyards, slows down the somewhat frenetic pace of the day.

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Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
SAVVYWINE BLOG Reports on the Rockpile AVA
~~And Other Miscellany and Mishegas

Thu, 21 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

The Rockpile AVA, in the outback of northwestern Sonoma County lies so far beyond the Dry Creek Valley that you are tempted to turn around and come back because no one would drive that far into the wilderness just to find a few grapes. Never mind that you have tasted some pretty good Zinfandels and Syrahs from this all but lost AVA, you will think you are on the road to nowhere as all signs of civilization save for the occasional cow lost on a hillside disappear into trees and scrub. Sure, there is a lake nearby and a few parking lots, but once you exit the Dry Creek Valley proper and climb into the hills that surround Lake Sonoma, you are surely lost.

Well, not so. And I can vouch for the fact that there is something comforting about giving away a precious hour or so of tasting time to commune with nature. There are only so many tasting rooms I can happily visit before quiet and beauty call more loudly than pulled corks, another round of Zinfandels and spit buckets that inevitably spit back if you are not careful. Your reward for this excursion is nothing more than the sight of few vineyards dotting the hills. There are no tasting rooms here. A few folks live in this no man’s land of a place, but they are hardy pioneers and you can’t see their spreads from the road in any event. The reason to go is to see it—to be able to say that you have visited were few men dare to go. You are practically Captain Kirk on a mission. Go and relax, and congratulate yourself for being brave.

Recently, the wineries that make wine from Rockpile put on a trade tasting at the Rock Wall Winery in Alameda. Some of you will remember that I live in that lovely and quiet suburb by the Bay, and besides, when folks like Rock Wall, Seghesio, Carol Shelton, JC Cellars, Paradise Ridge, Mauritson and several others are pouring wine that done so very well in Connoisseurs’ Guide blind tastings, how could I not go? I don’t write about such experiences very often. Connoisseurs’ Guide reports on finished, bottled wines tasted blind. Events of this nature don’t give me much to write about. But they can be interesting, and, since I was unable to stay for the entire event, I missed the sit-down tasting of older wines.

However, friend and fellow wine enthusiast, John Engstrom, has written a very long and interesting essay on the event and the sit-down tasting, and it is worth a look. His comments on winery styles makes very interesting and informative reading. It is found at http://savvytaste.blogspot.com/2010/10/rock-me-redux.html.

I rate it at: A.

And now for something completely different... Everyday I read a very handy website called The Daily Pour (http://dailypour.blogspot.com/), not to be confused with The Pour, which is the blog of NY Times winewriter, Eric Asimov. The Daily Pour offers listings of the latest blog postings from anyone with a blog who wants to be listed there. And it picks up the title and the first bit of text from each of those blogs. I do, in fact, read it every day.

Each reading takes me to blogs that look interesting, but each reading also finds titles topics and summaries than can charitably be described as amusing. Sometimes they are strange, but mostly the ones that tickle my funny bone are silly because of their incompleteness. If you are still reading after all that, here are a few things I have pinched from the Daily Pour. Contents in bold followed by the text that appears by way of intro to the topics covered. Snarky comments from me have been excised because these beauties can stand on their own. Beware. Some of these posts have serious commentary attached to them. I prefer to think of what Letterman would do with them.

Woot Wine! - One Week, One Wine
Sushi Chef 5 piece Sushi Kit - $14.99 - *Mama-san always said life is like a bento box of sushi* You never know what that pink squishy thing in the middle is.

Wayne's Gastropub
The Gastropub Phenomenon: Jaynes featured in today’s San Diego Union Tribune. - Gastro-huh? Gastro-what? Gastrointestinal?

Wine Compass Blog
Taste Live: Discover Beaujolais & Discover Virginia

The Blend
Spanish and California Whites Shine in Texas

On the Wine Trail in Italy
Profuse & Pulchritudinous Parmigiano Porn - Photos from the "Say cicciolata" collection"

Rockss and Fruit
Sick Tasting Notes - I am home sick with some sort of sinus infection, head cold, congestion thingie and thought it would be a perfect time to post some sick tasting notes

Worcester Sauce
Living on the edge: Wines of the Volcanoes

Wine And Food Wednesday
When Simple Dishes are Best

Wed, 20 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Steven Eliot

We are deep into tasting new, very young Cabernet Sauvignons for the December issue of CGCW, and we have the stained teeth and tannin-numbed tongues to prove it. A couple of nights back, I felt the need for relief even though Cabernet is still very much on my mind and went rummaging through the cellar for something a little more temperate and friendly. I settled on a bottle of the 1992 Livingston Cabernet Sauvignon from the Moffett Vineyard and grilled up a quick rib-eye steak. Now, I just wanted to drink something a little less bold and blustery than our daily fare of late, and I did not make that particular choice with any eye to didactic discovery, but the evening meal was not only pleasant, it was a compelling reminder of one of what, for me, has always been a cardinal rule in food and wine pairing, and that is it is best to keep the food simple when pouring a very complex wine.

When Cabernet Sauvignon is well made and from a good site in a good vintage, it is easily among the more complex wines to be had, and, when patiently allowed to slowly grow into full maturity, it has few peers as far as layering and nuance and subtle detail are concerned. All that and more was confirmed with the savory backdrop of a simple, well-marbled piece of beef, and I cannot imagine that the addition of involved sauces or spices could have made the pairing in any way better. The wine was supple and rounded and revealed flavors within flavors, and it seemed to offer more interest as a sip led to a bite led to a sip. The wine did not overpower, but it did take the lead if never by so much that my rib-eye became irrelevant. There was simply no competition but rather real affinity and remarkable concordance between what was on the plate and in the glass.

It was that moment of memorable matches when the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, and, before long, as great wines can do, this one had me contemplating places and people and what the last eighteen years have seen.

There is history in older bottles, to be sure, and a perhaps a bit of veritas for those willing to listen to what such a wine has to say. I would not have its voice diminished or drowned out by an accompanying course. Perhaps my profession has marked me indelibly with a wine-first mentality, or perhaps I was simply too tired to think of too many things at once, but that night, at least, I was not thinking of structure or acid or alcohol levels more than I was wondering at just how sublime a wine could be.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Dr. Vino Makes a Funny

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Full credit to Tyler Coleman, Dr. Vino, for allowing his blog to be occasionally nothing more than fun. There are plenty of blogs that are always serious. This one is—most of the time. There is the occasional blog that pretends that it is never serious—Hosemaster of Wine looked on the surface to be only for fun but we know better because deep in the heart of The Hosemaster burned a spirit seeking to redress the wrongs in the wine biz through the use of parody and ridicule. There are blogs that are just plain silly, although they are rarely funny. And there is Doc Vino who once in a while seeks out silly things and makes us laugh. Of course, Dr. Vino is mostly serious, compelling and occasionally sharp-tongued and accusatory—as he was in exposing the inconsistencies between the stated policies of independence and lack of bias at Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate and the very opposite practices of some of the people who worked there. He may have directed himself to Mr. Parker, but he was challenging all of us who write to be transparent about what we do.

Still, today I do not celebrate Tyler Coleman’s exposés—as juicy as they were and as intriguing as they became with twisting story lines and denials and late acknowledgements. Today, The Best of The Blogs enjoys a couple of short and sweet items that simply made me laugh out loud. They are here at http://www.drvino.com/.

But, while you are visiting Dr. Vino, you might be interested in another posting he made earlier which he called “In Praise of Mature Wine”. I have mentioned before that I have been collecting for more years than Connoisseurs’ Guide has existed and I have a lot of older wine—some of which is now too old. Doesn’t bother me all that much, because it is there to be enjoyed and it is a pleasure to pull out a fully mature wine now and again. The Dr. Vino article explored the joys and risks of pulling the corks on older wines and asked why it is that young people don’t like old wines. Not only was the article both smart and provocative but so were the responses. This is a website that I enjoy regularly. Go there for a laugh in today’s posting called “Sipped and Spit” and stay for some of the Doctor’s more serious medicine.

Monday Manifestos
Stop The Anti-California Nonsense

Mon, 18 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

I hear it all the time. You blare out “I don’t like California wines.” OK, but why is that you then follow that with an “oh, but”. It is time for the makers of “oh but” journalism to stop. You cannot tell me that you don’t like California wine, that they are all overripe and have nothing but primary fruit going for them, that they are “dreadfully generic”, that “they have become parodies of themselves”, that you like “quiet, not noisy wines”, and then add “oh but”.

You know who you are and you have to stop doing that, and then saying “oh, but” you do happen to like Failla Syrah or Dehlinger Pinot Noir or O’Shaughnessy Howell Mountain Cabernet. You have to stop telling me that Riesling is supposed to taste like mineral water with wine instead of water. In short, you have to stop insulting my intelligence with you backhanded compliments as if to cover you ass with faint praise—all the while intimating that if you have not named any other producers that you like, then all those other wines are some form of dreadful generics or parodies of themselves.

I know you mean better. I know you really like some California wines. I know you know that there are plenty of finely balanced, flavorful, complex Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs, Cabernet Sauvignons and Sauvignon Blancs. I know you know that there is more dull, boring wine in Bordeaux or Rioja than your comments suggest. I know you know that not all Burgundies taste like Romanee-Conti or Le Montrachet. I know you know that the beauty of Riesling is in its fruit—it is not called an aromatic wine for nothing.

I don’t care one way or another if you like California wines or you like high acid, green wines from somewhere across the pond. There are no disputes in matters of taste. But when you write in your newspaper or blog or book that you do not like California wine except for some chosen names, I get concerned. You see, wines like Failla Syrah or Dehlinger Pinot Noir are not unique. Yes, they are very good, but they are not unique. There are hundred more like them. And you tell me that you do not like California Chardonnay because they are too oaky, overripe and too low in acidity, and I then suggest that you try wines like Paul Hobbs Ritchie Vineyard, and you tell me “I love his wines. He’s the exception”, I get concerned.

I get concerned because you do like California wine but are somehow not willing to admit it. Is it because it is now au courant to say that you do not? Is it because some 25-year old sommelier told you that Muscadet is better with your Sand Dabs than Roth ($15.00) or Handley ($15.00) Sauvignon Blancs or Dry Creek Fumé Blanc ($12.00)? If you like Hobbs or Failla or Dehlinger or O’Shaughnessy, there are hundreds more like them. It’s fine to like minerally, brisk Chablis. Lord knows I do—for the right setting just as I like a big Pahlmeyer Chardonnay for the right setting. But, what I don’t get, what frustrates me into writing rants like this is the derision that you pile on California wines before you admit to liking them.

Sunday Serendipity
Resveratrol—A Brief Critique by Matilde Parente

Sun, 17 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

It has been nearly twenty years since the “French Paradox” reported on the CBS news program 60 Minutes and changed the way that we looked at wine. Could it be that there was a real, verifiable connection between moderate wine drinking and cardiac health? Did the consumption of wine somehow make up for the sins of indulging in butter, bacon, cream and the like? The facts looked like it might, and we hoped with all of our might that they did. Since then, there has been one medical finding after another that seems to affirm wine’s positive place in a healthful diet, and, as time has passed, wine has been cited as potentially preventing everything from cancer to cardiovascular and Alzheimer’s diseases. There remains plenty of debate in the medical community as to both the virtues and drawbacks of regular wine drinking, and there are a good many unanswered questions as to just what it is that is in wine that is responsible for its beneficial effects.

Now, we are not physicians, and we do not plan on pouring through the data produced by so many clinical studies. We would not claim to understand it even if we did. But like most who make fine wine and food a big part of their lives, we would like to know more on the topic than can be typically gleaned from the brief newspaper article, the audio soundbite or the single-screen internet snippet. We recently came across a brief little booklet that addresses the hows and whys with a little more detail and depth. Resveratrol, authored by Matilde Parente, M.D. and published by Woodland Publishing is at one and the same time a succinct summary of what we know about some of wine’s healthy properties, and it provides a longer look at resveratrol, one of the more beneficial biochemicals found in wine. It is written for the informed lay person rather than a scientist, and it offers a balanced discussion of what we know, what we do not and what we might be close to discovering. At 40 pages, it is an easy read, but if it can be digested in one sitting, it made an indelible mark in my thinking and compels regular revisitation.

Satisfying Saturdays
SYRAH Restaurant: Santa Rosa’s Best

Sat, 16 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

92 SYRAH BISTRO 205 5th Street Santa Rosa 707 568-4002 www.syrahbistro.com

I came out to San Francisco in search of education. I found sun, wine and crab cakes as added bonuses. I knew about the sun and the area’s natural beauty. They, and good schools, are what brought me here in the first place. The wine quickly became part of our weekend routine, but it took a while for the crab. Graduate students are not blessed with the resources for cracked crab. It was burgers and spaghetti, rice and beans for us. Early on, I dated a “locally grown” co-ed just long enough to be invited home to meet her parents. That was where I first encountered piles of fresh Dungeness crab and bowls of melted butter, warm sourdough bread and much better wine than we had been drinking in our Palo Alto sidestreet digs.

There were not many crab feeds after that, but the idea had been planted, and soon, I also discovered the wonders of crab cakes. Back east, the closest we ever came to crab cakes were stuffed quahogs (pronounced “coe-hog”), which may not sound like much but taste a lot better than they sound. A quahog, for the uninitiated, is a type of hard shell clam from which chowder is made. For those who care about such things, it is a different clam from the soft-shelled clam that is served up as those uniquely New England delicacies, “steamers” and “fried clams”. No, the quahog is not such delicate flower and gets chopped and cleavered into submission. Stuffed quahogs are a mix of bread crumbs and seasoning with bits of clam put back into the roundish shell and baked in the oven. The New Englander in me is still a lover of fried clams “with bellies”, but the San Franciscan that I have become is addicted to fresh Dungeness crab in almost any form that it appears.

A couple of decades ago, I found what for me has been the standard by which all crab cakes are measured. A local restaurant opened up nearby, and its opening chef, a fine broth of a lad by the name of Josh Silvers produced crab cakes so good that the very thought of them makes my mouth water. In time, the restaurant failed, for reasons beyond the chef’s doing, but Josh moved on. I discovered him years later up in Santa Rosa at his own place called Syrah. It is right there in downtown Santa Rosa, near Railroad Square just west of the freeway. Josh cooks what might be called Mediterranean food—things with extra layers of flavors all made from local natural ingredients. And, during crab season, he has a ready supply fresh off the boat just a few miles west in the Pacific Ocean.

There are a limited number of restaurants in wine country to which I will make a pilgrimage for the place alone, and Syrah is one of them. Not only is the food superb and the wine list impeccably drawn, but the crab cakes remain at the top of list for me. Syrah rates as my number one restaurant in Santa Rosa, and it is rated number one in Santa Rosa by TripAdvisor and Zagat. Go for the crab cakes and tell Josh that Charlie sent you.

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Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
An Homage to Rene Di Rosa

Fri, 15 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Rene Di Rosa died last week at the age of 91. I had intended to write this homage to my friend last Friday, but his passing was still too close. I would have written an obituary. There are plenty of those. This is an essay about a man who vision and passions made him admired by all who knew him. It is often said of people who led magical lives that their lives imitated art. For Rene Di Rosa life was art. His vineyard was a work of art. His aggressively modern art collection was his second vineyard. His zest for life informed all that he did. It was flattering that he was a subscriber and an avid fan of Connoisseurs’ Guide. It was infinitely more important that he was a friend whose invitations to dinner and fine wine were not to be missed and never turned down.

In the simplest of wine terms, he is one of the people, not the only one or the first, but a major personage nonetheless, in putting Carneros on the vinous map. His vineyard, Winery Lake, began gracing significant wine labels almost five decades ago back when the cold-loving varieties like Pinot Noir and Chardonnay were still substantially planted in the Napa Valley proper in locations that were too warm to make those wines as well as they could be made. Today, much of that land is in Cabernet Sauvignon and its related Bordelais brethren, while Pinot and Chardonnay have migrated to Carneros.

Di Rosa’s lasting vinous legacy can be seen both in the grapes he planted at Winery Lake and those plantings that followed him to Carneros. That is his vinous legacy, and while it will continue in respectful silence across the years, his artistic legacy will continue in full view. Di Rosa eventually sold off the vineyard and used the money to finance an amazing collection of whimsical modern art. A dinner visit to the Di Rosas eventually led into a discussion of his latest pieces-—not that he was bragging. He was not. He was exulting in the surroundings he had created for himself and his artist wife, Veronica McDonald.

Their artistic legacy continues today at the DiRosa Preserve, http://www.dirosaart.org/, a unique art museum rising behind the vineyards and filled with delights for the eye. Art as fun. Art as eye-candy. Art to delight and to extend one’s view of what art is. Rene Di Rosa died last week at the age of 91. His contributions will outlast us all.

5200 Sonoma Highway
Napa, California 94559
Phone: 707-226-5991

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Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
DECANTER Magazine World Wine Awards

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Our Grades:		The Judges: A
		The Methodology: B
		The Wines Submitted: D
		The Results: C+/B-

By Charles Olken

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I don’t know whether to congratulate Decanter Magazine for the enormous feat of tasting almost 11,000 wines in four days or to laugh out loud at the preposterousness of even trying. I don’t know whether having judges like Steven Spurrier and half the MWs (Masters of Wine) in the world tasting wines that surely are not the best in the world and then declaring them to be is good politics or a waste of talent. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry when this august body declares that Chilean Sauvignon Blancs are the best in the world. I don’t know what to make of the fact that these fancy judges gave medals to 78% of U. S. Grown Pinot Noir but gave no Golds to Red Burgundies.

Ultimately, it comes down to this. A judging is only as good as several factors let it be. The people who put on these mass judgings do not always have the resources to create the grounds for success. It costs money to fly people into London or Sydney or Dallas or San Francisco from all over the world. And it is difficult to create a perfect setting for judging ten thousand and more wines. Some judgings at which I have participated cannot figure out how to manage a few hundred wines. One of my personal favorites, the Sydney International Wine Competition, limits its numbers to 2,000 wines and takes six days to complete the effort. And then there are the wines. I have yet to attend a mass judging at which the best possible eligible wines, in my opinion of course, were submitted. And finally, there are the results. The results are no better than the first three factors allow them to be.

The first is the judges. In this case, there is no question. Decanter, which for my money is the best wine publication in the world, assembled a bevy of talent that has never been exceeded in any mass judging. Great writers, experienced tasters, some of them are among the foremost experts in the world for the categories they judged. No one is going to question, should question the competence of this jury. If only they had been matched by methodology and wines. The judges rate: A.

The methodology is at any of these mass judgings is highly suspect if only because of the number of wines tasted. Eleven thousand wines were judged over four days. If those highly qualified judges were split into ten panels, that is eleven hundred wines or about 275 per day. Decanter does not give us full details but even if there were twenty panels, the number of wines judged would have been enormous. Some tasters, myself included, no longer participate in these kinds of beauty contests because the amount of care needed to make careful judgments between competing wines is simply not available given the large number of wines to be tasted. I will give Decanter a grudging: B. If nothing else, with judges of this quality and an experienced staff to run the judging, one does not hear horror stories about procedure.

But, here is the Achilles heel of virtually every one of these mass judgings. They have no ability/zero ability to control the quality of the wines submitted. An English wine won the sparkling wine category. I have every confidence that it is a good wine, but its closest competition was a Taittinger Prelude, about the fourth tier of quality at that fine producer whose Comtes de Champagnes are truly world class. Prelude simply is not. Yet it was the competition, and Decanter has used that ranking of the English wine to proclaim that “this 100% Chardonnay fizz rubberstamps England’s membership to that exclusive club of world class sparkling wine producers”. Sorry, Decanter. The wines rate at: D. And they simply undermine the value of the whole production and the 400-page magazine you published to trumpet the results.

The results: Let’s imagine for a moment that the august body of august tasters and their august palates did a fine job of finding the best wines in the tasting. Good on them. But do we really believe that an Israeli Syrah is the best Syrah in the world? Do we really believe that nobody in Champagne can make a better bubbly or that the folks in the Loire or the cooler parts of California or Marlborough down New Zealand way cannot make a Sauvignon Blanc to challenge the two winners from Chile? Do we really believe that the Clos Du Val Stags Leap District Cabernet Sauvignon, a good wine for sure, is the best Bordeaux blend in the world? These kinds of results would be less bothersome if they did not get paraded under the title “WORLD WINE AWARDS”. Not good enough is the final judgment. Grade: C+/B-. And lucky to get it.

A final word: Events like this are publicity stunts. It matters not whether it is a County Fair or something else. Ultimately, they are about rewards for entering. At the Sydney International, only 100 wines get awards. That is supposed to bestow a certain special prestige on the winners. The problem is that even with that gambit and a very professional panel, the event is still about the awards, and both the wineries and the promoter make sure that those awards are widely broadcast. If you win with Decanter, they send you stickers to put on all your bottles.

Decanter declares itself “The World’s Best Wine Magazine” right on its cover. You can’t miss the words. And I agree with them. But publicity stunts are publicity stunts, and this one gets a passing grade but no honors. I presume it serves a great commercial purpose for Decanter. It does very little for wine lovers.

Wine And Food Wednesday
Oysters: We Like Oysters

Wed, 13 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We like oysters. We like them fried, roasted and grilled in their shells, but we like them most when fresh, raw and resting on ice...the oysters, that is, not us. It has been said that one does not eat oysters simply for sustenance any more than one drinks wine solely to slake thirst. Both are partaken for pleasure, and, when the right oysters are matched to the right wine, that pleasure seems exponentially increased. Now, we have also heard more than once that pairing oysters with wine is difficult and that not many wines work with oysters, but we disagree on both counts. We have slurped our fair share of these briny beauties at a number of culinary events over the past couple of weeks, and, as practice again proves that it makes perfect, a few simple guidelines should pave the way to success.

The first and overriding rule to be observed is that the wine should be fairly light and refreshing with a good streak of acidity keeping it bright and buoyant. Even if quite flavorful and involving, the best oysters are after all not especially heavy in taste or texture. The old classics from France such as a young Muscadet de Sevre et Maine, a stony Chablis and our favorite quaff with oysters, any Champagne – especially Blanc de Blancs – still stand with the best.

But we recently found a new match, and one that should not surprise us but perhaps was hiding away in the back of our memory banks. New Zealand’s vibrant Sauvignon Blancs, as we learned gulping new Marlborough bottlings from Kim Crawford and Nobilo with outstanding Bluff Oysters from the country’s Foveaux Strait are absolutely marvelous matches to fresh oysters as well. In particular, we have to rise in praise of the New Zealand Oysters—not too big but exceptionally clean and crisp with just a touch of a meaty, briny edge, these beauties do not often show up on the West Coast, but they are not to be missed whenever you might run into them. That they went well with the New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs was the point of the exercise in the first place, but, for us, such exercises are experiments. Some work; some don’t. Most do not rise high enough to get a mention in our blog. This one does as do the wines below.

Even so, we can hear dissent in the distance from those defenders of the politically correct who suggest that everyone should drink whatever they like. No matter. We have our favorites and will continue to post them here. We hope you enjoy them and find them of some value, and we would love to hear of your own. And, when it comes to complementing oysters, the uninformed pouring of any randomly picked wine is just not in the cards. Syrah and Kumamotos, anyone?

87 NOBILO Regional Collection Marlborough 2010 $14.00
Geared to fresh grass and herbs in the nose and finding a sweet spot of pineapple fruit on the palate, this briskly balanced middleweight leads with bare hint of sweetness before its ample acids cut in. It may not be the most complex Sauvignon to be found, but its combination of freshness, fruit and a certain citrusy tang made it a most comfortable foil to fresh oysters.

88 KIM CRAWFORD Marlborough 2010 $18.00
Just a little more rounded and slightly juicier in character than the Nobilo bottling, this flavorful Sauvignon leans to figs and green melons with plentiful fruit that played a fine counterpoint to the slightly meatier aspects of the night’s oysters. Again, the wine finishes with the requisite burst of bracing acidity that cleanses the palate and inexorably leads to another oyster or two.

89 NOBILO Icon Marlborough 2010 $22.00
There is a real boost in overall richness and weight here, yet if a bigger and bolder look at New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, Nobilo’s Icon is charged with lots of vibrant, keenly fit acidity that makes it a winner with oysters and white-fleshed fishes alike. Its abundant gooseberry-like fruit and accents of fresh juniper will hold it in good stead when richer shellfish dishes are served, but its keen sense of balance wards off the least sense of heaviness.

91 KIM CRAWFORD Spitfire Marlborough 2010 $26.00
The star of the night and quite simply one of the better New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs that we can recall, this “small-parcel” bottling is rife with bright fruit and is styled in a somewhat tighter and crisper vein. Its underlying suggestions of minerals and stones play beautifully against fresh New Zealand oysters, yet it has the fruity stamina and unmistakable depth of a wine that will work famously with dishes ranging from grilled salmon to sea bass to milder poultry. It is in short supply, but it is a wine well worth seeking out.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
WINE SLEUTH: A California Chick in London
--Italian Sweet Red Muscat

Tue, 12 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Recommended by Charles Olken

About three decades ago, my dear wife asked for her living room back. I would not have minded, but I was running a business there. And that business was beginning to make money—something it had not done for the first half decade of its existence. So, when she requested that I do something to return the house to some semblance of normality, I was not exactly happy. Here I was contemplating retirement from the world of finance and economics, and she was dreaming of a major construction project. You see, it all goes back to when I started Connoisseurs’ Guide some years earlier than that. We put a large tasting table in the living room—it being the only room in the house able to hold a platform for our tasters to gather around. Now she wanted the room back.

I drew up plans, and quickly rejected them. We then hired the leading architect in our little town, a creative genius by the name of Italo Calpestri, and Italo designed us the house of our dreams. Never mind that I had to work another five years. And when architect Calpestri was done and we had a little dinner party in our new grand dining room, he and the house were the guests of honor. He brought along with him a wine that his grandfather had carried to the United States from the old country—an 1886 Passito, a sweet wine. Years later in 1986, we gathered again with Mr. Calpestri and opened the wine on its hundredth birthday. It was, as advertised, a sweet wine made from dried grapes, and it was served with thin slices of Parmigiano-Reggiano. Heavenly. The bottle resides in a place of honor in our kitchen—the one that Mr. Calpestri designed because my dear wife also, and correctly I might add, decided that it also needed to be upgraded.

It turns out that a California chick over in Jolly Olde is currently touring Italy and has come across a sweet red dessert wine. It is a wine that is more youthfully simple than a 100-year old bottle, but it reminds me of the joy we all felt when the 1886 Passito turned out to be not just tolerable but actually still quite good. Her blog, WINE SLEUTH: A California Chick In London is worth a look for its attractive photography of the Italian country side and because it introduces a wine that is not an everyday commodity but is worth a try if you can find it.

Monday Manifestos
The King of The Wine Blog Rants

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It is easy to rant about things that bug you. Lord knows I do it often enough. A couple of years ago, when I belatedly discovered the wine blogosphere and the many, many thoughtful people who post there, I got drawn in to the conversations, debates, foolishness, argy-bargy that goes on in such places and I liked it. Here were all these folks, many of them new to wine and others simply new to writing in public about wine pontificating on everything under the sun from Biodynamic viticulture to the amazing value of Tweeting. You do know what Tweeting is, don’t you? You just press your fingers together and 140 characters later, you are a writer.

I have tried my hand at this “Tweeting”, and if I do say so myself, I am amazingly erudite in 140 characters. The problem is that I can’t stand being limited to 140 characters. And I hate that “you are” has become “u r”. I hate it because I just don’t get it. Maybe it’s an age thing. But, I do tweet—just not consistently or on any kind of schedule. Part of the problem is that trying to say anything meaningful in 140 characters is just not easy. Maybe a couple of thousand, but not 140. And, it does not matter that I have hundreds of followers, most of whom I have never met, never will and who have signed on to be my followers because I have “wine” in my profile, and I mention “wine” in my posts. Folks seem to like that even if they are in Australia or South Africa or they simply want to sell me something. Writing the word wine is like putting honey out to catch bears. Maybe you will catch a few, but mostly you will catch flies.

No one writes to me when I author my chirps. . . . . er, I mean my tweets. I can chirp away for half an hour and all I get in response is chirps from other chirpers that have nothing to do with mine. Do you know how many of my fellow wine chirpers like to tell me about what they had for breakfast? Or what their children had for breakfast. There is even one, although I have expunged her from my list, who knows a lot about wine but likes to tell her followers (I follow anybody who is silly enough to follow me) all about her continuing experiences of drinking too much. That was too much for me.

Well, the real joy for me in the wine blogosphere is not Twitter, although you can follow me @CharlieOlken if the mood strikes you. The real joy is in other people’s blogs. I read many of them regularly and many more irregularly, and while there about a thousand wine blogs I have not read, the ones I read are pretty interesting. That is the raison d’etre behind TUESDAY TRIBUTES, The Best of The Blogs that appears in this space on—you guessed it—Tuesdays. There are some very smart folks out there. And not only do I like their writings, I like spouting off in the comments sections of those blogs.

In fact I like it so much that one of those bloggists, the redoubtable Tom Wark, from whom I have learned so much and used so freely in constructing this blog, commented that my postings on other people’s blogs are often longer than the original posts. I would like to apologize for that to my many friends out there in wineblogland who have so kindly tolerated my verbosity. I never set out to hurt you—please believe me. I just find it necessary some to add my two, three and four cents worth.

Am I the King of The Wine Blog Rants? Probably not. I’m too nice for that. I am probably more the king of the “if one sentence will do, two sentences will do better” crowd. On the whole, its nice work if you can get, and you can get it if you try—for free. You can find me on Twitter(RSS ), on facebook and here. I have even written longer responses here than my original posts. Who knew the Internet could be such fun?

Sunday Serendipity
Firelit

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

We happily count more than a couple of noteworthy wineries as our neighbors here in Alameda, among them, Rockwall Wine Company and Blacksmith Cellars, and our little island in the East Bay is also home to the artisanal distillers, St. George Spirits.

The self-described philosophy of the folks at St. George Spirits is “California Cuisine is known for being ingredient driven and our California spirits follow suit. Our distillery is a kitchen of sorts and our spirits are made from the most extraordinary fruit, vegetables, herbs, grasses and grains that we can find.”

We have known and admired those who oversee St. George’s stills for a good many years, and besides being ardent fans of their various elixirs, we can testify to the fact that, in their eyes, absolutely nothing, from basil to berries to Blue Bottle Coffee, is off-limits as a object to be transformed by the distiller’s magic. Firelit Coffee Liqueur, a collaboration between Jeff Kessinger and St. George Spirits distiller Dave Smith, is the most recent in a long string of remarkable tipples produced hereabouts, and it is quite unlike any coffee liqueur I have ever tasted. It is made from cold-brewed coffee, Batch #1 from single-origin Yemen beans and Batch #2 from Ethiopian Yirgacheffe both selected from Oakland’s Blue Bottle Coffee company, layered with Chardonnay brandy, Madagascar vanilla beans and a modest measure of cane sugar.

Kessinger says that “the goal was just to make a coffee liqueur that was about coffee, not about the sugar”, and there is no question that the goal has been met. This stuff actually tastes like coffee, but coffee of the first quality with real complexity and a sense of depth that makes the likes of Kaluha and Tia Maria seem simple and mawkishly sweet. The only down side about it is its very limited production. Only 1800 bottles of the sold-out first batch were released earlier this year, and recently released Batch #2 is similarly in short supply. It can be found on the lists of three dozen or so of the Bay Area’s better restaurants and on the shelves of specialty retailers. It is priced at $50.00, but a little goes a long way, and any who fancy themselves dyed-in-the-wool coffee lovers will find it a revelation and nothing short of a bargain.

Satisfying Saturdays
A Few Ideas For Napa City

Sat, 09 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Truth is that I don’t venture much into Napa City. Despite being the economic gateway to the Napa Valley, Napa City requires a detour. The main road to the Napa Valley runs west of town and directly up to that string of jewels starting with Yountville and ending twenty-plus miles later at Calistoga. Those places and Oakville, Rutherford and St. Helena are wine country. Napa City, despite attempts to say otherwise, is not. It is an urbanized home to automobile dealers and hospitals and all of the urban trappings needed from a “central city” of sorts. The wine country towns have restaurants, hotels and, yes, Virginia, that most treasured possession of all, wineries. Napa City may have a tasting room or two, and it does certainly have hotels and restaurants, but it is not wine country. It is the guardian of wine country. It is the servant to wine country, but it is not wine country. And I don’t go there much.

But, anyone who goes to wine country as much as I do is going to find himself in Napa City sooner or later. I have developed a short list of favorites, and while I would need to visit them more than I do in order to write a full review, I can recommend each of them based on one very good visit and the strong recommendations of the folk who turned me on to these places. One of these days, a fuller review will appear in this space, but for now, these places are worth knowing.

92 NEELA 975 Clinton Street Napa, CA 94559 707-226-9988
www.neelasnapa.com
I am far from an expert on Indian food. I just like it. No, I love it. Neela in Napa, Ajanta in Berkeley and Amber India in San Francisco are my “go to” places. This gem, located in a side street just off Napa’s Main Street is pleasant enough to look at. It is far better than that to eat at. Go read the website and the reviews cited. I endorse all the positives, and I can say flat out, if you like Indian food and you are looking for an alternative to the pricey, night-long eating events that await you at The French Laundry, La Toque, Auberge du Soleil and their ilk, go search out Neela.

91 UBUNTU 1140 Main St Napa, CA 94559-2639 707-251-5656
www.ubuntunapa.com
I may not be an expert in the intricacies of Indian food, but I eat it fairly regularly. Ubuntu is a vegetarian restaurant. I am a carnivore. If it had not been for a friend who directed us there because he knew it was good and I had heard amazing things about it, I would simply have not gone there. Frankly, it was an amazing experience. Our group of five ordered thirteen small plates, which was almost everything on the menu, and the worst of them was delicious while the best was mind-blowing. The menu, as befits a restaurant where everything is fresh, changes with the season. The October menu, currently on the website, is quite different from the menu that appeared in front of us last Spring. I will head back to Ubuntu again. I am in love. Who would have thunk it?

THE FATTED CALF The Oxbow Public Market 644 C First Street Napa, CA 94559 Phone (707) 256-3684
www.fattedcalf.com
This fabulous charcuterie is an offshoot of a place in San Francisco’s increasingly chic Hayes Valley. I have never been to the San Francisco outlet, but I have stopped off when in Napa to pick up a thing or three. It is a dangerous place to my wallet and to my waistline, but that does not stop me from wandering back. I am not much of a fan of The Oxbow Market with its hodge-podge of stalls and purveyors of good cheeses and wines and cheap ethnic foods. The Fatted Calf, more than any other place in that much-ballyhooed complex, draws me back for the special sausages and salumi. My friend Tom Wark, whose blog, Fermentation (http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/) is one of the very best, recently wrote a short story about the chicharones sold at The Fatted Calf.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
A Busman’s Holiday

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Think of it as a person who drives a city bus all week going off on a long drive for vacation. Think of it as a fishmonger putting out to sea for a week. Think of it as a school teacher attending classes in the summer time. Think of it as a winewriter who spends his holidays in Bordeaux and Tuscany, in Champagne, the Veneto and Rioja.

Where do you spend your holidays? The “busman’s holiday syndrome” strikes pretty close to home for the Olkens.

This year’s possibilities include Portugal, New Zealand and Provence (it’s been eight years after all—something might have changed). At least, last year we strayed only as far as Washington and Oregon. It is not as though we have not also visited Paris or Barcelona, but somehow when the subject of vacation comes up, wine country around the world seems to beckon hardest.

Our neighbors are just back from China. They can’t stop talking about how much they loved it. Oh sure, they think the Chinese food in San Francisco is better than in China itself, but we will forgive them that because they admitted to not recognizing some of the proteins they were served. My good friend Earl Singer, with whom I started Connoisseurs’ Guide back when we were both children, is off to India. I think it is his third or fourth trip over there. But the Olkens are thinking of Portugal, New Zealand and Provence.

Well, it is not like we will be alone. A few years back, walking down the street in Adelaide, we came across Kendall-Jackson head winemaker Randy Ullom having lunch in a sidewalk café. In Tuscany, we ventured into a restaurant of intriguing repute called Da Antonio. It serves only fish even while sitting smack in the middle of the Chianti Classico region. The locals, it turns out, call it “Fish In Your Face”, and the monicker is well deserved.

One of our party mentioned that I was a winewriter to the waiter—a defense against an overaged Italian Chardonnay being pushed in the direction of the Americans. The waiter told Antonio who was then sitting with some other Americans, and a few minutes later, a booming voice across the restaurant cried out “Are you Robert Parker?” Antonio then ambled over and invited me into his cellar to look at his collection of California wines—all seven of them. By the way, if you go to Tuscany, Da Antonio is not to be missed—and not only because it breaks up the pattern of similarly cast menus. You can have simple pastas and simple proteins or you can have fancy pastas and fancy proteins. At Da Antonio, you will have fish—whatever fish Antonio’s family and its fishing fleet an hour away at the coast have sent over that day.

There is this thing about wine country. It is almost universally beautiful. It does not matter if it is the rolling hills of the Yarra Valley outside Melbourne or the rolling hills of Champagne. It does not matter if it is the Chianti Classico region with its towns on hilltops and its vines stretching down into the valleys or the Douro Valley with its towns along the river and its vineyards stretching to the sky. It is familiar yet it is different. It has no pyramids or great walls or Coliseums. It has no skyscrapers or grand arches or thousand-year old cathedrals. Yet it beckons, and we are going back again this year.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
CONSUMERS FIGHT BACK: The American Wine Consumer Council

Thu, 07 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Our Grade: A+

There is a piece of legislation currently being considered in the Congress of these United States that threatens to make wine consumers who would buy wine over the Internet into second class citizens. We have commented on this legislation before, and we continue to be incensed by the brazen attempt by States and the liquor and wine distribution wholesalers to eliminate your rights. Let us be clear. The three-tier system of producer, wholesaler and retailer in this country is entirely a creation of government. It serves the wineries not at all, and it serves only those retailers who believe they should not have to compete. It ill-serves the consumers, not because wholesalers should not exist for those producers who like that model, but because it is artificially imposed on every producer, and it robs consumers of choice and of price advantage.

Now someone is fighting back. Today, the formation of the American Wine Consumer Coalition (AWCC) was announced. It is still in its formative stages and has not yet begun to fight. But it will. It will fight to protect you, the wine consumer by first preventing the passage of legislation that ignores your needs and, instead, panders to the often unnecessary third tier. Connoisseurs’ Guide to California Wine endorses the AWCC and urges you to join and to support its efforts.

Below is the full text of its opening salvo:

American Wine Consumer Coalition Launches to Raise Up The Voice of Consumers—

(Napa, CALIF—October 6, 2010): In Michigan, legislators stripped consumers of their ability to have wine shipped to them from retailers...without ever hearing from consumers. In Illinois, the legislature did the same, again without consulting consumers. In Washington, DC, legislators heard testimony on a bill that would severely impact consumer access to wine...without inviting any testimony from consumers. In fact, when lawmakers and regulators around the country enact rules and laws affecting consumer access to wine, consumers are never consulted. There is a simple reason for this: Wine consumers have no voice.

Enter "The American Wine Consumer Coalition" (AWCC).
(http://www.facebook.com/americanwineconsumercoalition)

Launched yesterday in its initial phase as a Facebook entity, the AWCC has the mission of representing the needs and desires of the wine consumer and wine lover in the United States and to be their voice. The AWCC aims to bringing together wine consumers from across the country in a coalition that will give voice to wine consumers' concerns regarding their rights, their access to wines and their inclusion in policy discussions surrounding consumer access to wine. As well, the AWCC seeks to create an organization that will deliver to consumers educational and lifestyle benefits that speak to their well-documented love of food, travel and wine.

CONSUMERS LEFT OUT OF POLICY DISCUSSIONS ON ACCESS TO WINE

"The 'Three-Tier System' of alcohol distribution that is in effect in most states is misnamed," said Tom Wark, an organizer of the AWCC. "This system of government regulated alcohol distribution should be called the 'Four-Tier System' to recognize the consumers' critical place in that system. Yet consumers are ignored when alcohol policy and laws are debated and enacted, leading to a system that does not take into account the needs and desires of real wine consumers. Our goal is to end this dismissal of wine consumers by creating a coalition of consumers that can raise up the voice of the 'fourth tier'."

The goals of the newly created American Wine Consumer Coalition include:

Gather under the AWCC roof a supportive and educated community of wine lovers and consumers who are willing to help advance a pro-consumer agenda where alcohol regulations are concerned.
Advance the interests of wine consumers in state and national bodies and institutions where laws and regulations governing consumer access to wine are determined.
Create state-based chapters of the AWCC and tools for members to contact their representatives when issues arise in state legislatures that affect their status as a wine consumer.
Deliver benefits to wine consumers that support their desire learn about wine and enjoy a lifestyle in which fine wine, travel and culinary education and experiences are a significant element.
Provide members of the AWCC with access to unique and original wine-related information and events for their continuing education and enjoyment.

Of primary concern to wine consumers in America is gaining access to the hundreds of thousands of wines that are now available in the American marketplace. To have access to these wines consumers must have rights to buy and have wines shipped to them from out-of-state wineries, wine stores and importers. Too often the majority of wines simply aren't sold in the various states, making inter-state direct shipment a critical element in wine consumers' lives. In addition, wine consumers ought to have the right to carry back with them or arrange to ship back home the wines they purchase when visiting wine regions outside their own state. Often "personal importation laws" make this extraordinarily difficult for consumers. Finally, many of the rules and regulations that govern the direct shipment of wine to consumers place extraordinary burdens on consumers, such as forcing them to visit a winery before they can actually join a wine club and receive regular shipments.

The AWCC is currently working to gain consumer support via its very active Facebook presence. This will be followed by the development of further communications initiatives, the introduction of member benefits and the introduction of advocacy efforts on behalf of consumers.

Wine And Food Wednesday
GREAT MATCHES: Red Wine and Fish – Part Deux

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Much ado is made these days about “food and wine” pairing, and, on the topic, there are so many truth-telling voices in print and online ready to call in secret and science as proof of their worth as to make one’s head start to spin. There are those that embrace hard and fast, tradition-bound rules and others that encourage a bit of experimentation experimentation and daring. Others take the anarchist’s approach and argue that we should drink any wine with any dish because we are all unique with “tastes” determined by everything from genetics to learned behavior, and that voices of experience rather than offering guidance and advice are merely those of self-professed, status-seeking experts and that any principles of food-and-wine matching are nothing but bunk.

The latter argument goes that a given food and wine match is neither wrong nor right and that if you like it, it cannot be wrong. We would not contend the point. BUT, while we would not dismiss or demean anyone who relishes a combination that we might find unpleasant, we would also argue that there are pairing principles that ring true to most of the people most of the time and that a few simple guidelines make sense. If left wholly alone, how long might it take for someone to eat the same steak dinner with a different, randomly chosen wine before finding something that tastes good? Given the number of wine types available these days, it could take months or years before hitting the mark. Simply knowing that Cabernet tannins are tamed by service with meat fats and proteins, that a bit of sweetness can take the edge off of foods that are spicy or a little too tart, and that white wine acidity will cut through oily fish and cream sauces to refresh the palate is neither the realm of arcane science nor cynically placed barriers to culinary freedom. A rudimentary road map that comes warning signs that a young vintage port may not be the best foil to oysters and that Syrah rather than Pinot Grigio might be a better partner to braised lamb shanks will prevent the novice wine drinker from driving the car off the cliff. What basic pairing principles represent is a certain winnowing, a narrowing down of the options for likely success; a beginning point that comes with some sense of safety. They should not be held as commandments and, even after decades of practice, we still come up with matches that are unexpected successes engage in plenty of experimentation of our own, but, when given their due, such “rules” can easily prevent wholesale disaster even if not necessarily predicting a truly great match.

The idea of the “great” match is what actually triggered today’s ramblings and revisitations to the notion of how food and wine work together. The really remarkable, stop-in-mid-sentence food and wine matches are all but impossible to predict. I cannot say that I have had a bad food and wine match in quite a long time, but every now and then, all of the tiny variables of ingredient, seasoning, technique, varietal, vintage, mood and moment come together at the table in a positively transcendent moment. I have heard from more than one accomplished chef that you might know that a certain recipe and wine will marry well, but just how well is only revealed in the doing. I was reminded of just that this morning when during a break from teaching, my executive chef at the California Culinary Academy came to me said, “remember how you have always said that the greatest matches were something you could not predict, that you really had to actually do it to know?” He then gazed dreamily into the distance and waxed poetic about an especially marvelous weekend match between a bacon-wrapped pork loin and a Grenache-based Rhône blend whose soupcon of Syrah spice to the match to apparently very special heights. There is far more to great matches and meals than a sum of the parts, and I hope and suspect that they will never be explained by science. There is art and discovery and reasons aplenty for experimentation and wandering outside the lines... even while starting out with a few basic ideas.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Steve Heimoff on Blind Tasting: We Respond

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Steve Heimoff is the California wine reviewer for Wine Enthusiast magazine. He also writes an eponymous blog whose existence is totally independent of his magazine day job. Because his personal blog is so well-written, accessible and interesting, it has risen to the very top of the popularity charts. There are different ways of measuring these things, but, by any one of them, Steve’s blog now rates with leaders of the wine blogosphere pack.

He typically writes during the five weekdays, and rests on the Sabbaths. He covers all kinds of things, and his blog entry last week about his drive to Santa Barbara was awarded our blog of the week for being a beautiful loveletter to the beauty of the California countryside. This week he is back with a tale of tasting at a winery in Santa Barbara, and he is asking questions about the role of blind tasting in the context of a debate he had with a winemaker last week about this very subject. I have very strong feelings about this subject, most of which agree with Steve, but not all. Still, for bringing this subject out into the open and for the extended set of comments on his blog from all sides of the wine world, this entry entitled Reopening the blind vs. open tasting debate makes Steve the first back-to-back winner in Best of The Blogs.

Here is an excerpt from the Heimoff article followed by our full response.

HEIMOFF: “I tasted and reviewed the Margerum and Happy Canyon wines open, not blind. In doing so, I explained to Doug (Margerum) that I usually review wines at home, blind, under stringent circumstances; and I was feeling a little guilty that I was tasting them open, with the winemaker, at the winery. I added that I could only try to be as objective as I could despite the non-blind circumstances.

Well, Doug had what can fairly be termed a strong reaction to that statement. He told me in no uncertain terms that he didn’t believe I should be tasting his wines blind. (!!) We ended up having a discussion, and below are Doug’s reasons, as I understood them, why a critic shouldn’t taste blind.”

I read Steve Heimoff, the blog, every day. And long before the CGCW blog came into existence, I became a regular contributor/debater on that blog. I have been in this business for a few years now, and, not surprisingly for a critic, I have a few opinions. Below is my statement about blind tasting as posted yesterday on the Heimoff blog. The references to Oded and Adam are Oded Shekked, owner/winemaker at Longboard and Adam Lee, owner/winemaker at Siduri.

OLKEN: Perhaps a few facts will help.

--I consider Oded and Adam to be professional friends. I mean my next comment as no criticism of them. BUT, in this seemingly never-ending discussion, and why should it end anyhow, it is the wineries and distributors who want their wines tasted with the label open. And, from that, I infer that they believe there is some benefit to them. Otherwise, why care?

--Wineries pull this "I do not send my wines out for review" crap all the time, "but you can come to the winery and I will let you taste anything you want". Adam and Oded are not among those who do that. So, I asked Tom Rochioli for a second bottle to replace one I bought at a store. His response was "come on up. I don't send out wine for review".

I asked how it was that Parker and Tanzer were reviewing his wine. He said they come to the winery. I asked if he thought that it was appropriate to have wines judged that way instead of in blind, peer-to-peer comparisons and he replied, "I GET BETTER SCORES THAT WAY".

Apologies for the caps, but that phrase goes to the heart of Doug Margerum's comments. He thinks he gets better scores when he is there explaining his wines to critics and explaining the context in which they fit. Never mind that he is not serving them to the critic in that context. He is explaining the context and telling the critic why his wines are better than they seem. Again, otherwise why do it unless he thinks he benefits from that process?

The point of blind tasting is to make judgments about wines in neutral context and to bring one's tasting acumen to bear. The (Margerum) argument that one cannot taste Chinon blind against Happy Canyon Cab Franc is a red herring on both sides of the equation. Simply put, no one does that. It is an argument ad absurdum. Speak about context. That argument has no context because it is not done in order to achieve finite ratings by anyone with any sense of knowledge and responsibility.

Joe Roberts (1WineDude) does make a valid point. There are differences in the ways in which reviewers operate. Guys like Steve and myself are what I call "comprehensive reviewers". We taste everything of a variety we can get our hands on. Other folks have other mandates, and their comments are far less comparative, can be shorter, like Joe's, or longer like Brooklyn Wine Guy's, but they are not meant to be comprehensively definitive, even when they appear with a rating. OK, I get that.

But, when it comes to the Wine Enthusiast, to my Connoisseurs' Guide, to Parker or the Spectator, the consumer has every right to expect the reviewer to taste blind as a way of eliminating the bias that creeps in otherwise. Yes, context is important, but an experienced reviewer tastes wine blind and supplies the notion of context. "This bright, acid-driven yet not outrageously sour Chardonnay would really work with oysters on the half shell". Or conversely, "This bright, acid-driven Chardonnay will take the enamel off your teeth, and serving it with oysters is not going to make it or them taste any better".

If a reviewer is not capable of tasting a wine and discerning not only its quality but what the right context is for that wine, then the readers of that reviewer are being shortchanged. Tasting at the winery with the labels showing, the winemaker at your elbow chatting you up and winery dog licking your hand is, in my opinion, the antithesis of the way a professional taster should bring context into play. It is the taster's job, not the winemaker's job to bring context into the evaluative process.

I hope you don't feel guilty, Steve, but I also hope you don't review those wines, because even if you are totally transparent about where and how you tasted them, you still face questions of unintended bias. I presume that this column is actually part of your process for dealing with that very concern, and I applaud your approach. I just believe that your reviews oght not be done that way.

Respectfully submitted,
Charlie

Monday Manifestos
In Defense of California terroir
— Strongly . . . and Mostly

Mon, 04 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

For more than a few years now, whenever conversations about California wine turns to “terroir”, I feel my muscles tense, my stomach tighten, and I start looking for the fastest escape route from the room. One little word and a good day turns to gloom because I know that debate is about to displace discussion. Lines are drawn and sides are chosen, and what seemingly began as an exchange of ideas and perspectives among wine lovers is about to become a battle of dyed-in-the-wool true believers that reminds me a little too much of present political bouts between tea-party types and liberal democrats. What is funny is that few can even agree on what the word means let alone whether California wines may or may not reflect it.

Traditionally, the word “terroir” refers to a wine’s ability to display a sense of place, that the varied influences of a growing site from geology to topography to micro-climate will, when “faithfully” interpreted by a sympathetic winemaker, provide a wine with a unique and predictable voice that may remind of what a given variety can produce in other locals but is its own identity. The “rub”, of course, is the role of the winemaker/grower. There are many who see the winemaker as irrelevant in the equation, that the one true terroir is fixed and eternal and independent of human influence; that terroir will show through regardless of who makes the wine. Others will argue that nurture is as important as nature in the expression of terroir. Now, I have no argument with either view, and I find real intrigue in the philosophical implications of each. I do not cringe at the efforts to define what terroir is.

I do, however, object to the seemingly inevitable drift in the discussion to the suggestions that California wines do not and perhaps cannot have a sense of place. And, equally bothersome is the corollary argument that California wines have been high-jacked by manipulative, insensitive winemakers who pander to critics and cynically sacrifice true terroir in their pursuit 90-point endorsements. I have lost count of the times when I had to endure one more silly complaint that all California wines taste alike and that none tasted of place. My first response is that any attentive tasting of the State’s better bottlings makes such a stance ill-informed at best. As just one case in point, we recently finished our October review of new Pinots Noirs, and not only are there clear character changes from appellation to appellation, it would be hard to miss the undisguised differences in the single-vineyard bottlings of Kosta Browne, Lynmar and Roar to name but a few.

Would the same nay-sayers find no difference among Joel Peterson’s brilliant Ravenswood Zinfandels from Old Hill Ranch, Teldeschi and Big River? Does such logic place Ridge’s marvelous Montebello Cabernets in the same tiny box as those of Paul Hobbs, Staglin and Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars? Those wines deliver clear statements of their respective provenances and are not simple reflections of winemaking imperative. There is clearly a real sense of “place” to such wines that becomes plain to those who would look. Perceiving and defining a vineyard’s true character is not easily done, of course. As has been the case with France’s finer sites, the land’s voice will become clear only after many winemakers have made many wines from the same place in many vintage conditions. In many ways, California is still a young winemaking culture, and, while we are still learning what the land has to tell us, we have ample evidence from locales like the West Rutherford Bench, the Dry Creek Valley, Westside Road and many others that great wines are not just enjoyable because they are good, but that they also will often share a commonality character with other wines from the same location.

To be sure, there are times when the winemaker’s hand or an excess of ripeness is sufficient to overcome anything that might smack of terroir. One can find plenty of remarkable, complex, deeply flavored and oh-so-satisfying wines whose lack of keen geographic identity is no liability. The naysayers who demand that all wines first have a sense of place miss the obvious truth. Wine first must taste good. That great wines can and very often do come with expressed terroir is a bonus, and it can be found in California wines as readily as in wines from other places in the world.

Sunday Serendipity: Book Reviews
Reading Between The Lines, Terry Theise
Daring Pairings, Evan Goldstein

Sun, 03 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Written By Bob Foster, Book Reviewer, California Grapevine

Note by Charles Olken: Back in 1974, about the time that Connoisseurs’ Guide was created, and actually getting into print a couple of months ahead of CGCW, the then-called San Diego Grapevine began publishing in a somewhat similar format as Connoisseurs’ Guide. Its publisher, Nick Ponamareff and I became long distance friends and have remained that way for the last three decades and more. Bob Foster, an attorney by day and wine lover at all other times, has been reviewing books for the Grapevine for many years and is, to my way of thinking, the pre-eminent reviewer of wine books extant. His work appears regular in the Grapevine, itself a six-times per year newsletter. You can learn more about the Grapevine at http://www.calgrapevine.com/.

Reading Between The Lines, Terry Theise, The University of California Press, Berkeley, 2010, 189 pages, hardback, $24.95. Terry Theise is one of the best-known wine importers in this county. His portfolio with its emphasis on German wines is well known to most wine lovers. In this work he outlines his highly opinionated views about how wine can move us and why wine is important. His emphasis is on small producers whose wines speak of the place where they are grown. He clearly does not find much value in wines that are indistinguishable as to their source. It is impossible, in some instances, to distinguish a wine from Italy from one from the US. He is no fan of the 100 point system used by so many wine publications. He finds that the system implies a scientific precision in a clearly subjective area. He also notes that even with wines made by the gigantic producers, each bottle is continually changing. A numerical score is only a snapshot of how that wine tasted on a particular day to a particular palate. Assigning points to subjective matters can lead to absurd results. He gives Molly Blooms soliloquy a 94 and the death of Ben Gant a 99. As Theise writes, tongue in cheek, “But eventually I came to realize that all pleasure was in effect a commodity, and I owed it to myself to quantify the little suckers.”Theise expounds on his beliefs as to why wine matters and why he often finds the greatest value in the wines of small artisan producers often from Germany. An intense, interesting personal statement of beliefs and purpose. If only it had an index. Highly Recommended.

Charles Olken comments on Terry Theise: I devoured this book in one day. I may not always agree with Theise but I love reading his writings in this book and on the website for his import business. He is perhaps the person singularly most responsible for the revival of interest in Riesling in this country. And, if you ever have a chance to listen to him in person, do it. He is quite the speaker, is our Terry.

Daring Pairings, A Master Sommelier Matches Distinctive Wines with Recipes from His Favorite Chefs, Evan Goldstein, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2010, hardback, 353 pages, $34.95 Unlike many food-wine books that simply list wine friendly dishes, Master Sommelier has carefully analyzed the keys to understanding food and wine pairings. First he points out that acid is the counterpoint to an array of dishes. In dealing with dishes that are rich, salty, oily or mildly spicy, a wine with a tart edge will be effective and refreshing.Sweetness can counterbalance moderate levels of spicy heat. It can also be an effective counterbalance to salt and can take the edge off of foods that are too tart. He adds that essert style wines must be sweeter than the dessert itself.Goldstein finds that tannin works well with bitter foods. Tannin can be cut with fat and protein. He notes that oak flavors are accentuated by food and one has to carefully choose the method of preparation of the food by grilling, blackening, smoking etc. The author then applies these (and numerous related principles) to 36 different wine and food combinations. The recipes are listed by the wines they complement. The wines chosen run from the familiar, such as Cabernet Franc, to the obscure such as Xinomavro and Mencia.Well illustrated in a center section of color photos. This package is complemented by a good index. Highly recommended.

Charles Olken comments: I am a great fan of Evan Goldstein, and for those of you who remember, Square One in San Francisco, the great cooking done by his mother, Joyce Goldstein, from whom Evan seems to have learned a thing or three. His first book, Perfect Pairings, is well-used in the Olken kitchen. This book, with its references to grapes that hard to find and with recipes supplied by chefs who seem not always to have gotten the message that the recipes were supposed to be about the wine, not about themselves, is a less interesting read, and a far less valuable book. Buy Perfect Pairings instead of this one. It is the best book on the subject. Daring Pairings is a stretch that did not work for our household.

Satisfying Saturdays
Prima Ristorante

Sat, 02 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

92 PRIMA RISTORANTE 1552 North Main Street, Walnut Creek, California (925) 935-7780
www.primaristorante.com

By Steven Eliot

Back in the 1970s, during the early days of California’s rapidly growing food and wine revolution, one of my favorite local haunts for fine wines was the Walnut Creek Wine and Cheese Company, and I have remained devotees of the place as it evolved over the years into Contra Costa County’s premier Itailan restaurant, Prima Ristorante. In many ways an iconic reflection of the innovation, increasing sophistication and professionalism that has made the San Francisco Bay area one of America’s most exciting culinary communities, Prima Ristorante is today headed by Executive Chef/Owner Peter Chastain. Local seasonal and sustainably-produced ingredients are Prima’s mantra, and the restaurant’s ever-changing menu of regional Italian cuisine consistently reflects sophistication, balance and restraint.

I have found its remarkable pastas preparations flavorful without being weighty, and Prima’s delicate gnocchi are as good as any I have ever encountered. I still recall a perfectly prepared gazpacho of late- summer tomatoes and a Fava Bean Risotto that was at once both light and remarkably deep in flavor. The evening’s secondi of savory braised rabbit was the kind of accomplished and utterly delicious entrée that guarantees repeated visits. The service is impeccable, professional and informed and never intrusive, and the décor is warm, rustic and upscale all at the same time.

With hundreds of listings that range from simple, refreshing Proseccos to rare, vintage Champagnes, and from well-aged Brunello to classic clarets , Grand Cru Burgundies and hard-to-find California collectables, the outstanding wine list is in itself reason enough for a visit and is a reminder that wine has from day one been a pivotal concern and real passion for Prima. Wine director/owner and sixteen- year Prima veteran, John Rittmaster oversees the restaurant’s collection as well as Prima Vini, a full service wine store that is located just one door away and a must-visit destination for any wine lover.

Comments on WINE NEWS OF THE DAY

The news, as reported by The Telegraph.co.uk:

“Last week, in eastern Washington State, a ton of the Mourvedre– such as is used in Chateauneuf-du- Pape - was stolen from a vineyard in Benton County. The Mourvedre vines were picked clean of $40,000 of grapes but the Cabernet Sauvignon fruit nearby was left untouched. Mr McBride, a partner at Grand Reve Vintners, said: “They were professionals. For somebody to think “Gosh, I have just got to have that Mourvedre” takes a real wine geek.”

And it is not only human hands that the farmers have to guard against: birds, squirrels and even bears can be responsible for disappearing crops, while in South Africa, baboons caused so many problems for winemakers near Cape Town by feasting on the Sauvignon Blanc crop that “baboon monitors” had to be hired.”

CGCW Comments:

If that ton of Mourvèdre was worth $40,000, we will be a monkey’s uncle. No wonder the baboons are stealing the stuff. And that was no wine geek in any event. No “wine geek” is stealing Mourvèdre and leaving the Cabernet Sauvignon. That is just further evidence of the work of baboons.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
ADELAIDA CELLARS
~~Hard To Reach But Worth It

Fri, 01 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

It was about 1:30 on a sunny Saturday afternoon when the phone rang. “Hi, Charlie, we are here in Paso Robles wandering around wine country with Jim and Jonel and we were wondering if you have any favorites down this way that we should not miss.”

It turns out that the question is a lot tougher than it sounds because I don’t do much touristy touring around Paso Robles. I am either there on business or I am not there. For better or for worse, my recreational visits are geared to places closer to home like Napa and Sonoma and to Livermore which is sort of in my backyard (same county, at least).

What came to mind rather quickly was a memory of a visit to the hills west of Paso Robles some two or three decades ago, and my answer became abundantly clear. “Darned if I know”, was about all I could say. Except this. “There is a property in the hills to the west that is worth the visit, if only because the territory is so lovely. I know nothing of the tasting room scene at Adelaida, but I recently had a very comfortable chat with some folks at the winery. They were very helpful and happy to assist me in getting the information I needed. Go try Adelaida.”

A few days later, when my friends the Birds, Dick and Di, were home they called again and were ecstatic with their visit. They enjoyed the drive as much as I had and they called to say thank you. One of these days, I am going to head back down that way, and Adelaida Cellars will be at the top of my list. I like their wines. I like their locations. My friends loved their tasting room. When you think of it that way, there is not much not to like.

ADELAIDA CELLARS
5805 Adelaida Road
Paso Robles, CA 93446
(800) 676-1232
www.adelaida.com

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Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Advice on the Aging of Wine

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

All of us who write about wine have, at one time or another, been asked questions about the aging potential of wine—either in generalities or, as often happens around Connoisseurs’ Guide, about specific wines. While most wine drinkers do not put wine away for ages, and often not at all, the folks who hang out around here are far more likely to have wine collections and many of you have serious cellars with temperature controls, attractive displays and computer-driven inventory lists. Today’s article, about to be graded, is probably not directed at the typical CGCW reader, but it makes interesting reading nonetheless. It is written by Laurie Daniel, the very knowledgeable and thoughtful writer for the San Jose Mercury-News. Laurie’s columns often also show up regularly in the Oakland Tribune and Contra-Costa Times, as those latter papers are under the same ownership.

This article, even accepting that it is written for a newspaper audience, grades out at: B. You can and should check it out at: http://www.mercurynews.com/libations/ci_16155996?nclick_check=1

OK, a bit unfair, but, hey, when you have 700 words, it is worth going beyond mere generalities even for a newspaper audience. Laurie is a professional writer, and this piece whisks along smoothly and is easily consumed. Newspaper articles are supposed to be like that. I know. I used to write some of them, and it was always a struggle for me to be open and easily understood when my CGCW style was much more structured, deep and intentionally as complex as the wines I was reviewing. I will admit that I envy folks like Laurie, whose writing style is friendly and comfortable.

That said, this article, which I commend to you, in part because it is like a review course, and in part because it won’t take long to read, does go over the basic ground work for aging and identifies the technical and hedonistic considerations that come into play when judging how long wine can be aged. Laurie is careful, too careful in my humble opinion, to say that she does not wish to tell anyone how long wine should be aged. That is half a copout. Each wine is different and she is not talking about specific wines. How does one then talk in more distinctly advisory terms than the article offers. To me, the answer is to be more specific, and to talk about the specific characteristics one would face in a young wine and how to assess them. Those items are listed, but not assessed.

Enough said. It is a well-written article with less to say than I think it could have said, and that I and CGCW have said in the past. Nevertheless, if I can criticize, even a little bit, I owe it to you to add my own take on aging. Look for it in upcoming blog entries. In the meantime, I do recommend that you have read of Laurie Daniel’s article. It is not wrong, and it is a reminder that we age wine for a reason. On that latter point, her article is spot on.

One way of continuing the conversation about aging is to look at the way individual recommendations for aging get made. Below are reviews of three wines followed by commentary about why Connoisseurs’ Guide choose the specific aging regimen recommended and further comments about longer term ageworthiness.

96 FREESTONE Chardonnay Sonoma Coast 2007 $75.00
These two Chardonnays, from the new Phelps-developed effort out near the Pacific Ocean in an area that seems certain to gain great fame for its deep yet tight and complex wines, are nothing short of stellar accomplishments. They have succeeded in being deep and layered without resorting to high ripeness, and they possess the enlivening acidity that has become part and parcel of the new Chardonnay paradigm in California. This wine comes with a slight haze in its appearance and, like the best efforts of that genre, its fruit is sweet and pulpy, deep and vital all at the same time. Long, fruity, tart, tight and promising to gain greater range over time, this wine is about as good as it gets and joins a very select list of our favorite wines.

Most Chardonnays, including those that would like a few years of age, are virtually ready to drink at an early age. But this one, despite being attractive now, has a hidden message. The wine, because of its depth and its tart and tight stance at the moment, has the makings of a wine that will get better and better for two to four years. After that time, it becomes a wine that will take on a different personality. In this case, its fruit will not fade so much as soften a bit, but its underlying acidity should hold it together for a decade or more. Aging Chardonnay more than a decade is always a gamble, yet given our experiences with well-fruited, high acid wines like older Gary Farrells, Grgich Hills and Marimars, and even the 1974 ZD enjoyed at our Millennium dinner, we would not be surprised to see this wine age for a second decade in reasonably good shape.

96 STORYBOOK MOUNTAIN Estate Reserve Zinfandel Napa Valley 2007 $50.00
This bright and buoyant young wine is rife with a wealth of precise, optimally ripened blackberry fruit, and, while rich and nicely extracted, it never once drifts towards the chocolaty excesses that plague so many big Zins. Supple and fleshy with a bit of baby fat at the moment, it exhibits exemplary balance and structure with well-placed acids, and a light touch of tannin adds welcome firmness to the finish. Its stays fixed on deep, nascent berryish fruit all the way to the end, and it comes with reasons aplenty to expect that even more to like will come if it is allowed to develop for a few years.

This wine illustrates a couple of points that should not be overlooked. The first is that Zinfandel is not necessarily a long-aging wine. Yes, there are wines that age well, and over the years, we have recommended a fair number for longer aging than the majority of their peers. But, when we do, we recognize two factors—even those that outreach their peers are not going to age like Cabernet Sauvignon, and those that do age well have both depth and balance on their sides. The second point that comes into play here, beside organoleptic evaluation, is history. There is no better teacher than history. When we recommend a Storybook Mountain wine for long-aging, we do that armed with the knowledge of how those wines have aged over time. Theoretical models are fine; past experience is more determinative than theory.

87 LEDSON Cépage Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma County 2007 $86.00
Raspberry and red cherry scents are filled out by suggestions of chocolate and a touch of caramelized vanilla bean in the nose of this full-bodied, slightly plump offering. It is a little soft at the edges and invites early to mid-term consumption despite the obvious tannins that arise in the latter palate.

Cabernet Sauvignon is the longest-aging wine we make in California—although devotees of Petite Sirah might argue otherwise. The choice of this Cabernet is designed to illustrate why tannin alone does not lead us to recommend lengthy cellars stays. Here is a wine with plenty of astringency, but it also comes with a softer underbelly, and wines like that often get flabby as they age. Because it is Cabernet Sauvignon and tannic, we have no doubt that its tannins will survive. We are less sure about the wine.

Wine And Food Wednesday
On A Desert Island

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

When not tasting and writing CGCW, I spend much of my time at the front of a classroom teaching wine appreciation to student chefs at San Francisco’s California Culinary Academy, and one of the most-often asked questions thrown my way is “what is your favorite wine”. Now, my usual reply is simply that I have no favorite; that everything depends on the mood, the meal and the moment. Not long ago, however, one of my charges rephrased the query in a way that I could not escape through my tried-and-true equivocation. The question went something like this: “if you were on a desert island and could have a steady supply of only one wine for the rest of your life, what would that wine be?” Now that was actually something to think about, and, when the thought had run its course, my answer turned out to be West Coast Pinot Noir. Mind you that Riesling was a real contender, but, assuming that my meals were not limited to island fare such as coconuts, bananas and such, Pinot would win out both for its inherent stand-alone beauty and its remarkable versatility at the table. There are few varieties that are as comfortable with such a wide range of recipes ranging from flavorful meat entrees to poultry to meaty fishes to a host of vegetarian preparations, even some dishes employing tomatoes. And fine Pinot is compulsively drinkable even when not accompanied by food.

It has been called among other names, the “heartbreak grape” and the “nightmare grape”, and it has been called the “perfect grape” as well, and experience teaches that it can and has earned every epithet aimed its way. One its principal appeals is that it can succeed in a number of styles from firm and light-bodied to full and downright opulent, but even its biggest and boldest versions are free of the tannic astringency that limits so many rich reds to service with hearty, tannin-taming meat dishes. “Great” matches may take a bit of fine tuning (Oregon versions with salmon and tuna, those from Carneros and the Russian River Valley with duck and pork, lamb and juicy cuts of beef as a foil to the fuller renditions from the Santa Lucia Highlands for example), but “good” matches come as easy as pulling a cork, and when you start asking chefs and wine lovers to pick to their favorite matches, the menu seems nothing less than endless. I will never tire of great Cabernet Sauvignon with the perfectly grilled steak nor forego complex Chardonnay with lobster in sauce or Sauvignon Blanc with a platter of oysters, but if I had to select a single bottle not knowing what the meal was to be, there is no safer, more-likely-to-please pick for my palate than fine Pinot Noir.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
Travels With Steve

Tue, 28 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Every northern California wine lover, and most of the rest of us if the truth be known, has made the drive from San Francisco to Los Angeles the long way. The short way is fast freeway down I-5. People say it can be done in six hours or less. I know it can because Mrs. Olken and I did it thirty years ago in her Porsche. I did not fall in love with her for her Porsche, but I sure liked it when it joined the family. No such luck today--the family car is a station wagon. But, sooner or later, driving I-5 gets to be a big bore, and even if we are not headed to wine country, taking the longer route down 101 calls to us and six hours turns into nine. Of course, one does not have to go all the L. A. to take the more scenic route. There is wine country down that way and with places like the Santa Lucia Highlands reachable in two hours, Paso Robles in three and change, Santa Barbara in four if you do not stop at Morgan or Justin or Adelaida or Alban or Talley or Laetitia, it is a drive we all have done or ought to do.

The other day, my winewriting buddy, Steve Heimoff, set out to make a visit to Santa Barbara County and when he got there, he wrote the best California driving story this side of William Steinbeck. It inspired many of us to comment on his blog with nothing more than “thanks for taking us along on the ride”. If you have ever made that drive, or if you only want a feel for the countryside along a rather lengthy wine trail, this entry in the eponymous blog, Steve Heimoff (www.steveheimoff.com) is must reading. Herewith, excerpts strung together and demanding that you go read the rest. Follow the link above for the rest.

“I’m in the little town of Santa Ynez, in the heart of the Santa Ynez Valley of Santa Barbara County. The weather is coolish. As in the North Coast, Central and Southern California have had their coldest summer since the 1940s. Vintners down here don’t seem as freaked out about the vintage as those in the North Coast, though. I think the main reason for that is because they basically don’t have to worry about rain, even though the harvest is 2-3 weeks later than normal. Precipitation falls off rapidly south of San Francisco, although it’s also true that in an El Nino year, L.A. can have more rainfall than the City by the Bay. I like the drive down from Oakland to the Santa Ynez Valley — that is, once I’ve busted out of Bay Area traffic. Thank goodness for CDs. I put on “Revolver” and it hasn’t lost a thing over the last 45 years. The Beatles are rock’s Beethoven.

Past San Jose, the 101 opens up. People knock the 101 but to me, as a wine lover and someone who appreciates California geology, geography and history, it’s a fabulous road. First you hit the Coyote Valley, still verdant despite on the verge of being gobbled up by San Jose. Then there’s that long, tortured stretch through the hills of San Benito County, old, rugged, rural California, at this time of the year golden and craggy and just fine to see. I always look for the turnoff to the Monterey Peninsula. It’s a sign I’m about to break out of Northern California to the Central Coast.”

Go read www.steveheimoff.com. Winewriting is not always about great wine. Sometimes it is about great drives.

Monday Manifestos
A Lesson In Tipping

Mon, 27 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I wrote a tip on Saturday night for about 67% of my share of the bill. As far as I could tell, my table mates without being prompted did the same. It took me a moment or three to come to grips with all this largesse, but it was so right that I am now privately embarrassed that I had even so much as a hint of a second thought.

In order to get to the lesson, however, I have to do a bit of name-dropping. You have rarely seen us drop even a hint of a name inside Connoisseurs’ Guide, but this just seems so right that it has to be done. You see, last Saturday night was the big Reunion—although that title is a bit odd for a group of people who actually had never met each other face to face. Rather, it was a gathering of people who have become friends because of the Internet. We are all wine people, of course, and you have probably heard of those good folks if you have been reading the wine blogs. But, even our four-hour dinner and bragfest would not be news if it were not for the wines that we brought along. That—and how the restaurant treated us.

We choose to gather at Estate, the newish restaurant just off the Plaza in Sonoma town. It is owned by the same people who have brought us Girl and The Fig, one of our favorites for many years. Girl and The Fig is a Rhône-wine directed restaurant in menu and wine list. Estate bows to Italy rather than to Provence, but, despite its somewhat fancier digs, it still has a casual, bistro/trattoria kind of feel and pricing.

There were seven us to start, eight by the end of the evening, and all of us have long-involvement in the wine industry. Tom Wark, whose blog, Fermentation, is one of the best anywhere and is considered by some to be the granddaddy of the wine blogosphere for his promotion of it was there with his fiancée, Kathy, who, it turns out is a major operative at the wonderful Failla winery. Their inclusion of a wonderful Failla bottling was appreciated because all the other reds were ancient and showed it one way or the other. Ron Washam, whose blog, The Hosemaster of Wine, has gone into retirement, was the only person at the table who had met everyone else. He was the glue that held everything together, and he was the host to our guest of the night, Samantha Dugan, whose day job is running the French wine section at the large and popular wine store, Wine Country, down Long Beach way. Sam’s blog, Samantha Sans Dosage, is one of those unique pieces of literature in which wine is the base but not the story. John Kelly from Westwood Winery, and later on, his assistant Eddie Townsend, rounded out the group.

Here, just because name-dropping is such fun are some of the other wines tasted. A couple of currently available Champagnes, non-vintage Camille Savés Brut, a rich and caramel-tinged cracker barrel of a wine was followed by a lighter and more elegant Billiot 2002 Brut. Then the reds starting coming out. Chalone 1978 Pinot Noir (a bit funky but still with that special layering that those old Chalone Pinots possessed), 1990 Chateau Fonsallette Côtes du Rhône from magnum with its mix of ripe and hazelnut scented fruit, 1996 Edizione Pennino Zinfandel also from magnum with fully mature tannins and the beginnings of claret-like layering that Zin can give at times, 1985 Stags Leap Wine Cellars SLV Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine that John Kelly helped make when he was at that winery and 1970 Beaulieu Georges de Latour Private Reserve, now past its prime but not the least bit oxidized and promising to live another twenty years in its role as senior statesman. We ended with 1985 Chateau Suduiraut Sauternes.

Now, here is where the lesson, or several of them come in. Restaurants everywhere plan to make money on wine sales. It is part of the business plan, the structuring of the presentation, the reason for a well-constructed wine list at any restaurant worth its salt. Good wine is part of recreational dining. Folks like our group simply do not eat at restaurants whose attitude toward wine is less than respectful. We expect wide-ranging, fairly priced lists; we expect knowledgeable waitstaff and a wine steward/ sommelier who knows the list and can help even wine geeks like us navigate among wines we may not have tried recently or ever; we expect good stemware; we expect the restaurant to charge a reasonable corkage fee but to honor that fee with timely wine service.

At Estate, we never did get to explore the list. We had too much wine for that. But what we got was all of the wine service and attention that one could ever want. At one point, we ran the kitchen out of glasses as we kept opening, pouring, sampling and moving on. Never a complaint from anyone; only an apology followed very shortly thereafter by a busboy rushing over with freshly washed glasses. To say that the wine service was exactly what we wanted would be an understatement. Decanters appeared when decanters were needed. Glasses were whisked away when we were done with them, and new ones appeared as if by divine intervention.

And then the evening ended some four hours later and the bill came. The server, who had spent the entire evening feeding us and caring for all of our wine needs, announced that the restaurant was waving its corkage fees. I doubt they knew exactly how many bottles got opened in any event, but this much is true. The corkage fee, it if had been charged, would have matched or possibly exceeded the price of dinner. It became instantly clear that we had to figure out a way to honor the service provided and also to recognize that the restaurant had honored us. In the end, we each added our own tip to our portion of the bill. In my case, it amounted to some reasonable facsimile of what it would have been if we had been charged corkage plus a bit more to recognize that the waitstaff would have earned an even bigger tip if we had purchased the wine off the list.

This was not the first time that any of us had learned the lesson of tipping based on the level of service rather than the bill, but, as I noted, it still took me a second or two to mark down an amount that was two-thirds of the actual bill. Restaurants should, I think, understand that wine service comes in all kinds of forms and be ready to serve those varied needs. Estate did and its waitstaff got amply rewarded.

Sunday Serendipity
OSOCALIS RARE ALAMBIC BRANDY
www.osocalis.com

Sun, 26 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Despite that fact that plenty of brandy is made in California, most of it is dull, insipid, mass-market stuff that comes pouring out of industrial column stills in an unceasing stream. True Alambic, single-pot-still brandies created with an eye to the traditions and techniques of fine Cognac are a comparative rarity in the Golden State but, when good, can challenge the best in the world. From time to time, we will be checking in on the devoted few West Coast artisan distillers who have chosen the road less traveled and begin our report with tiny Osocalis in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Our introduction to Osocalis came a few years back while attending a weekend wine event hosted by the Santa Cruz Mountains Wine Growers Association. Having heard that someone up in the mountains was making serious brandy, we made a spur of the moment decision to take a break from tasting wines and headed up Old San Jose Road out of Soquel to see for ourselves. There is little about the place that suggests it is anything more than a working farm in the mountains -- an old farm house, a big barn that leans to one side and the usual assortment of livestock. In all truth, we wondered if we our directions were wrong or that perhaps that we might be wandering into dangerous territory where everyone on the mountain shared the same name and that unannounced visitors might be regarded as “revenuers” and summarily dispatched.

Daunted but determined we headed for the barn, the door of which opened and out came founder and distiller Dan Farber who welcomed us in. What was meant as a brief visit turned out to be a considerably longer stay and we listened as the thoughtful and articulate Mr. Farber spoke at length about Cognac, Calvados and California fruit. Very much convinced of the richness and depth inherent in local grapes, Farber works with a small, 100-gallon antique French Charentais still in crafting small lots of exquisite brandies. Dan makes the point that whereas French law imposes fairly strict guidelines as to what varietals are allowed in making Cognac or Armagnac, he has freedom to blend and gain complexity from a wide range of grapes that are off-limits to his French counterparts. Fully cognizant that brandy can only be as good as the grapes and wine from which it is made, Dan partnered with Jeff Emery, winemaker at nearby Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards in 2003, and the two work closely together in getting things right from the start. If there is a downside to the brandies of Osocalis, it is that they are and will remain in short supply. Unlike wines that are held by a winery for no more than a couple of years, fine brandies require years of time in the barrel and are not something that can be hastened along

The standard bearer for Osocalis, the Rare Alembic Brandy ($45.00), is composed principally of Pinot Noir and French Colombard, and strikes for what is to us a wonderful balance between the finesse and real elegance of fine French Cognac and the flavorful underpinnings of California fruit. It smacks of vanilla, crème brulee and dried fruits, and, while very rich, it is light on its feet and shows the real polish possible from carefully made, well-aged spirits. It is a house favorite hereabouts and whatever search its finding might entail is well worth any effort.

Osocalis Distillery
5579 Old San Jose Road
Soquel, CA 95073
(831) 477-1718
www.osocalis.com

Satisfying Saturdays
GO FISH

Sat, 25 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

89 GO FISH 641 Main Street St. Helena California 707-963-0721 www.gofishrestaurant.net

By Charles Olken

Perhaps it is the New Englander in me, but I get a little weak in the knees when offered a chance to eat at a good seafooder. We have plenty of them in the Bay Area from Tadich’s for old-fashioned fish and big French Fries with the best sourdough bread to Yankee Pier with its reminiscences of home to Berkeley’s Sea Salt, a new favorite of ours. But, you would not expect to find a great seafooder in the Napa Valley. Sure, there are some decent whites made there, but this is red wine country and Cindy Pawlcyn’s GO FISH cannot even smell the ocean on a windy day. And yes, this is the same Cindy Pawlcyn whose Mustards Restaurant has been worshipped for years and whose Cindy’s Backstreet off the main drag in St. Helena offers the best comfort food in the Napa Valley.

I happen to like GO FISH for lunch rather than dinner. This is a restaurant whose menu does not exactly encourage one to pull the cork on a deep and bold Cabernet Sauvignon. Let me have my seafood grills and my sushi with lunch thanks and I am happy to luxuriate in one of the best white wine lists anywhere. And, as a good restaurant should, in my opinion, it has a fairly priced wine by the glass program and an entire selection of favorably priced wines called 27 for $27. The sushi choices span the range from relatively simple to combinations that are Chef Ken Tominaga’s special creations. No cream cheese mixups here. Special sushi means just that. I admit to being especially partial to the mussels appetizer and the fish and chips because it just does not get any better than that at any of my seafood haunts. But, my secret, feed my passion menu is a handful of oysters and a couple of special sushi items.

The Napa Valley is loaded with fine restaurants. Over time, we will take you inside places that offer some of the most sophisticated East Asian Indian cooking in the Bay Area, to our favorite vegetarian restaurant, and yes, if we can get a reservation, back to the French Laundry after a several year hiatus (not that we have not tried, but this is the toughest reservation around, and well worth it if you have just knocked over the treasury at Fort Knox). But, not only is GO FISH the best for seafood in the valley, it is among our favorites for a mid-day stop.

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
CLOS PEGASE: At The Confluence of Art and Wine

Fri, 24 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

For forty years, the shining beacon on the hill in the north end of the Napa Valley has been Sterling’s Moorish temple of vinosity. But those beckoned by the light will find themselves running smack into an even more modern example of brilliant architecture that sits directly across Dunaweal Lane from the Sterling driveway. If you did not know it was there, Clos Pegase, with its the handsome post-modern building would sneak up on you and draw you in. The architecture is spectacular—for those who like that sort of thing. I do. And the sculpture that sits on all sides of the winery and even in the vineyard is of a quality that would make most museums green with envy.

The tasting room is not unusual. It offers the usual assortment of wines in several different options, but the scenery is so gorgeous both inside and out that concentrating on the wines is not always easy. And the caves built into the adjoining hillside are among the most interesting anywhere. In a valley that has caves and more caves from Stag’s Leap Wine Cellar at the south end of the valley to Beringer’s century old caves dug by coolies to Schramsberg’s mix of modern and old caves, this is a valley that has caves. It is also a valley with very good wineries by the score. Choosing which ones to visit confronts the traveler with an embarrassment of riches, and, ultimately, I choose to take my visitors to wineries where the wine is good and the visual setting is aesthetically pleasing.

The images below do a better job than I at describing both the tasting room and the many pieces of eye candy that bring me back time and time again to Clos Pegase. And, if you time your visit right, you will be able to enjoy winery owner Jan Shrem’s presentation of Bacchus The Rascal, a humorous look back at the history of wine. I have seen it several times and it is one of the most enjoyable vinous diversions in all of wine country.

Clos Pegase
1060 Dunaweal Lane
Calistoga, California 94515
www.clospegase.com

WINE OF THE DAY

I like Sauvignon Blanc, and it is a variety that Connoisseurs’ Guide covers several times a year because of the grape’s great versatility and priceworthiness. It is not a grape, however, that knocks down spectacular ratings and when a great Sauvigon Blanc, a wine of surpassing beauty comes along, it stands head and shoulders above its varietal peers. Such a wine is our Wine of The Day.

92 CLOS PEGASE Mitsuko's Vineyard Sauvignon Blanc Carneros Napa Valley 2008 $21.00 GOOD VALUE
As deep and well-fruited as Sauvignon Blanc is likely to get, this rich and outgoing rendition from Clos Pegase leads with classic varietal aromas of melons, sweet limes and leafy greens and follows with rich, mouthfilling flavors that are enriched by wonderfully proportioned oak. It is fairly full-bodied and slightly fleshy in feel, and, for all of its richness and size, it is beautifully balanced, remarkably vital and very light on its feet.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
The Wall Street Journal Hates Wine By The Glass

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Lettie Teague, one of two winewriters for the Wall Street Journal, should know better. She “simply hates wine by the glass”. Never mind that not all wine by the glass programs are created alike. Never mind that she readily admits that she will drink sparkling wine by the glass. Never mind that her proofs are dismembered by the reality at almost any restaurant with a respectful (for its customers) wine program. Never mind all these things and more, Lettie Teague hates wine by the glass and has thrown the whole concept under the bus with her latest article in the Wall Street Journal.

I rate her article at C-.

It could have been worse, but somehow, without bothering to tell us how to judge a good wine by the glass program, she does at least point to a few restaurants that get it right. Otherwise, I could have given her a D. She, in fact, does know better, but she slanted her article with prejudice from the outset and failed the most basic test that is required of wine writing. She did not offer a solution to the problem she claims to exist and that anyone who has every encountered a wine by the glass that has stood around too long waiting to be consumed knows to be true. Wine by the glass programs can be horrid when wrong. But, they are not all wrong, and the good ones do not suffer the problems that Teague heaps upon them by the bucketful.

Here is the proof. Teague claims that her first objection is cost. This is an observation that is more a factor of the entire wine list than of the wine by the glass program. Restaurants buy wine for about 66% of the cost of the bottle at retail. Cheap guys like me want wine in restaurants to sell for twice wholesale about 150% of retail. I rarely get my wish. But, it is not unreasonable to expect a good restaurant to sell wine for twice retail. That gives them a markup about equal to what they get on the cost of food. Yes, it can be argued that wine service is far less costly to the restaurant that food preparation and the margins are higher, and I won’t disagree with that premise. But I gladly accept wine sold at twice retail.

Not every restaurant does that, and I regularly refuse to buy expensive wine in restaurants when I spot markups of three to four times retail. Teague is correct that such markups do exist. There is a simple answer. Don’t pay them. I won’t. Instead of ordering a bottle, I order a glass. Sure the restaurant gets a pretty profit, but two things happen. They sell less wine, which means less profit overall, and I don’t go back unless someone else is paying the bill next time. Or, I simply bring my own wine, pay the corkage fee and either order something cheap by the bottle or just a glass to supplement whatever I have brought. Either way, the restaurant loses out.

I did a little research on this point before writing. Admittedly, it is not all inclusive, but I did choose four of my favorite restaurants. Sure, they are favorites because I have no axe to grind with their wine programs, but I go there for the food first. They are: Pappo, my local good restaurant here in Alameda where I live: the Bay Wolf on Piedmont Avenue in Oakland where I have had more good and important meals than any other restaurant in existence; Chez Panisse, Berkeley’s still-shining jewel; and, Boulevard, the single most reliable and very good, special, not over the top restaurant in San Francisco.

At each of them, wines by the glass are sold at approximately 25% of the cost of the full bottle on the list, and the lists at each of them charge about twice (200%) full retail or a little more. None of those restaurants has exorbitant wine prices. To read Teague, you would guess that overpricing was the rule. I chose to look at sparkling wine prices. Here is an example repeated a couple of times. A bottle of Roederer Estate Brut, at $23 full retail, costs $44 to $48 on those wine lists. On the wine by the glass program, a full pour of about five to six ounces costs $11.50 to $12.50. I care about such things because Mrs. Olken and I will more times than not order a glass of bubbly when we sit down to look at the menu.

Teague says that wines held for four or five days will begin to lose their attractiveness. With that, I have no argument. And if you are ordering wine by the glass at places that cannot move a full bottle of wine by the glass in that period of time, then the first rule is “don’t order wine by the glass there”, and the second rule might be “don’t eat there”. But, Teague is not even fully right on this point. “Wines opened for more than a few days”, she argues “will have their acidities dissipate”. Not so. Acidity does not dissipate. Fruit might. Oxidation might set in, but acidity does not dissipate. It is not unusual for sparkling wine sit open but stoppered in the Chez Olken refrigerator for several days. In time the bubbles begin to fade, but not the acidity.

Bottom line: Do not listen to the argument that you should not buy wine by the glass. It is a broad-brush philosophy that rings false at virtually every restaurant with a good wine program. And do not overspend for wines when the markups go charging through the roof. The truly odd thing about this rule is that the alternative is usually to buy wine by the glass or to buy a half bottle. The day when we could go to a fine restaurant and buy two full bottles for two people is long gone for most of us. Moderation has taken over, and wine by the glass programs also feed that need. Lettie Teague must surely know and the rest of us do surely know that not all wine lists are created equal. We choose to patronize the good ones. We can do the same for wine by the glass programs. If you live in San Francisco, you can go to any of the four restaurants mentioned and be confident that the wine by the glass program treats you with respect. And I expect that there are restaurants all over the country that do the same. By the end of her long article, Teague even admits to finding some in New York City.

Wine And Food Wednesday
The Killer Tomato

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Stephen Eliot

Despite the classic image of a big plate of spaghetti and meatballs accompanied by a jug of red wine, it is important to know to know that tomatoes can, in fact, be wine killers. Touted by some as being a “wine-friendly” food, tomatoes are anything but, and the indiscriminate matching of any red wine with tomatoey dishes can lead to patently unpleasant experiences. The key is to avoid wines with evident tannins insofar as high acidity, in the food or the wine itself, will amplify tannic astringency in a wine to the point that it supersedes everything else.Look for low-tannin reds that are, like tomatoes, both fruity and acidic for the most comfortable pairings. Barbera and lighter Sangioveses, the latter of which can be found in simple Chiantis are always a good bet as is California Zinfandel. Watch out for Zinfandels that emphasize high ripeness when serving the likes of red-sauced pastas, but those structured bottlings that keep alcohol in check will fill the bill nicely.

Among recent CGCW favorites, the beautifully balanced 2007 Ravenswood Teldeschi Vineyard and the 2007 Storybook Mountain Estate Reserve are classics that will pair wonderfully with Bolognese meat sauces, and the affordable Sonoma County duo of the 2007 Valley of the Moon and the 2007 Kenwood will do the job in washing down linguine bathed in marinara. Bigger Zins will match up well with appropriately heartier, tomato-laced fare, and an old CGCW favorite of Pot Roast slowly simmered with tomatoes and spices will prove the perfect partner to such heady, full-flavored offerings such as the no-holds-barred Zins of Dutcher Crossing, Seghesio, Rockwall and JC Cellars. Mind that balance is still the key to any successful food and wine marriage, and when ripeness runs rampant to the point of producing 16.0% alcohol monsters, even the richest recipes incorporating tomatoes will pale and a platter of meal-ending cheeses becomes the best choice.

Note: Steve Eliot, in addition to being Associate Editor of Connoisseurs’ Guide teaches wine appreciation at the California Culinary Academy. His classes always include experiencing wine with food.

WINE OF THE DAY

90 D-CUBED Zinfandel Howell Mountain; Napa Valley 2007 $37.00
Deeper and tighter at the same time than most offerings in our recent review, this is a very complete Zinfandel whose dried flower and ripe blackberry aromatics are accompanied by touches of caramelly richness. It is full on the palate and somewhat supple in the early going, has a distinct sense of polish that it shares with the following wine and runs into a layer of long-grained, soft but evident tannins at the finish. Time will see the wine open up, and a few years of aging would seem the best course.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
The Good Grape Finds ==> Something New Under The Sun

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

About the time I became aware of the blogs, which was probably later than most everyone else in the wine world, I found a controversy swirling that involved old media and new media. Or to put it more bluntly, at least in the way I see it, between newly minted writers, who self-proclaimed that they were part of the wine scene, and the old crowd, the so-called “traditional media”. It all seemed a bit silly, sort of like “handbags at ten paces” as the British like to describe soccer arguments between players who never get close enough inflict any harm. What I saw was a bunch old guys calling out young folk because these upstarts obviously had not paid their dues and too often, in the opinions of the old fogeys, did not know their onions, and a bunch of young fogeys in training who were responding with such harsh- sounding epithets as “dinosaurs” and “out of touch”. As I say, silly beyond words, and amusing to me because, despite the fact that I am undoubtedly the oldest of the fogeys and clearly a member of traditional media, I immediately fell in love with their energy, their passion, their lust for learning. And, yes, like the rest of the old crowd, I did sometimes find these young folks reaching beyond their knowledge and getting things a bit cobbled up. But, isn’t that what young folks do? It certainly is what I did three decades and change ago when I founded Connoisseurs’ Guide. Moreover, it is from this new class of writers, these pups, these whelps, these instantly famous journalists that the next group of “old fogeys” (meaning professionally successful wine journalists) is going to be formed.

Now, not all of those wine bloggers were new to the game, of course, but there, in the midst of the young and intrepid stood a man with a longer vision and a keen eye for truth, no matter where it came from. Jeff Lefevere’s blog, The Good Grape, was the most professional/insider of the “new writer” wine blogs even though he views the wine world from the outside. It is also a blog that has a freshness, a sense of vitality, a quest for what is coming next. It is an everyday read for me, and his entry of September 19, in which he explores the making of a new and quite attractive wine glass, has me committed to a side trip on my very next visit to Washington State’s wine country. You will find the blog’s home page here, http://goodgrape.com/, or you can simply click on the following link and go directly to the posting itself, The Entrepreneurial Spirit: Muehlhausen Glass. It is a deserving winner of The Best of The Blogs for the past week.

Herewith, an excerpt:

“I’m starting a periodic series of posts focusing on upstarts in the wine business. These “focus” stories won’t typically be about wineries, but rather ancillary businesses in and around the enjoyment of wine. These are usually people that love wine and want to pursue their passion, but they are also people for whom the entrepreneurial call doesn’t beckon towards the vineyard.

We start the series off with Meuhlhausen Glass, owned by glass artisan Ryan Muehlhausen and assisted by his Uncle, Steve Thompson. Muehlhausen lives and works on Lummi Island, a small island in the San Juan Islands off the coast of Washington state, equidistance between Vancouver, CA and Seattle and known for their arts community. There, Meuhlhausen launched a Sommelier wine glass, amongst his other work with functional glass as objet d’art.”

Monday Manifestos
A Two-Fer: Wine Labeling and Wine Blogs Go Political

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

Who Needs To Know About Alcohol Level?

By all rights, I should have spent this weekend writing about wine labeling, and, in particular, about the burr under my saddle that most wine labels create these days. Wine labels, it seems, are required to state the alcohol level in a bottle of wine, but not only are those requirements so loose as to be far too uninformative but the folks who write the regulations now allow wineries to hide the information as if it were some kind of bad relative from the country that nobody will admit to knowing. Go look for that required statement on the next bottle of wine that comes your way. Not only will it likely be hard to find in the first place, being stated in tiny print, often hidden amidst other designs, shown in grey on grey paper or something equally obfuscating, but half the labels coming my way now turn that information sideways and stick it in corners. Frankly, the whole business of alcohol level labeling has become a bureaucratic disgrace. There ought to be a law. Oops, there are several and they are not serving any good purpose. Apparently, someone thought you had a right to know. That is why it is required to state alcohol levels on labels. Apparently, someone else thinks that you only need to know if you win the label scavenger hunt. We will have more to say on this subject in the coming weeks and months, but we have been distracted all weekend with the question of political statements on wine blogs.

Anyone For A Political Opinion?

I somehow should not have to say this, but it appears that I must. I must because the question of whether a wine writer can have a political opinion and state it on his blog and still be considered an objective reviewer came up over the weekend on the very exceptional wine blog, STEVE HEIMOFF.COM. Most of you will know Mr. Heimoff as the person who covers the California beat for Wine Enthusiast magazine. Since he and I tred the same turf, we often run into each other out on the hustings, and we have become friends. Not social friends. He skateboards. I do not. He has a tattoo. I do not. He has a blog. I did not, and yet I like blogs and have been a frequent poster on his eponymous blog. His blog is personal and is not an extension of his day job. Mine, this new child of CGCW, is part of my day job, as well as my night job and my weekend job. I am always on because this is my house. I live here. Steve’s blog is his recreation; his day job is his day job. Fortunately for me, and for Steve Eliot, my associate here at CGCW, writing about wine is also part of our recreation.

The tempest in Steve’s teapot brewed up over his reference to none other than the Tea Party. Of course, his article had nothing to do with politics, but rather was a rather long and interesting discourse on the difficulties in the world in general and the wine world in particular. He mentioned that the uncertainty people feel has a lot to do with the rise of the Tea Party in U. S. political circles as part of “a lurch to the right in political sentiment”.

Now whether he is right or wrong in his judgment is not my concern here. Nor was it my concern when I read his longer essay and its essential points. But, some of his readers have objected on grounds that he is a winewriter, not a political commentator—and on that subject, even though he would like to talk about politics and his beliefs in his blog, he has indicated that he will not go there. He did in this one instance, and he (and I and all wine writers were challenged by a polite but pointed rejoinder from one of his readers). So, with that long introduction, I am now going to quote from the exchange, and I am going to end with my manifesto on wine writer politics and the influence of those politics on our writing.

A reader of Steve Heimoff.com writes:
I think you’ve been sneaking in politics even more since you said you were going to stop. At least you are leaving your Tea Party = Hitler rants on Facebook.

Charlie Olken responds:
Gee, I see far less politics here than before. Too bad. I kind of miss those old Tea Party = Hitler rants. I probably have pretty much the same progressive politics as Steve, although the closest I get to political discussions is commenting on Dan Berger’s rants (with respectful snarkiness, of course).

The reader writes:
This is probably why Steve has been trying (unsuccessfully) to keep politics out of his blog. Nothing good can come of it… I’m just still a little sore about his recent “hit and run” on VA Republicans.

Charlie Olken counters with:
Sir--I am not going to break Steve’s rules by commenting directly on politics, but it is pretty clear that hit-and-run tactics are not limited to Steve and those of his beliefs. It gets practiced at both ends of the spectrum. And neither is the equating of someone’s politics with those of Hitler. All you need to do is to think back to the last Presidential campaign. That kind of tactic was pretty one-sided. And it got worse during the debate over health care.

And while I strongly believe that my job as a wine critic is to evaluate wines, not the politics of those who make them or who drink them, I do think that we all have to remember that this is a personal blog and the person who writes it is not charging for folks to come here and read his thoughts. Even if I did not agree with him, I would not care if his personal views were shared here. Others do, and Steve has heard that and has cut down greatly on those kinds of comments.

The reader offers the following interrogatories:
Charlie--Thank you for your thoughful comments. To avoid speaking about politics, let’s turn the conversation to the more general issue… what is the responsibility of a blogger who is also a professional wine journalist?

How does the internet differentiate between quotes from a professional publication and a quote from a personal blog?
Does the average reader understand the difference?
Can a journalist retain an appearance of objectivity when they bare their political views for the world to see? (Especially with the wine industry being in the midst of an important and historic legislative fight, in the Congress and in many state legislatures.)
Does the blogger who is also a professional journalist have any responsibility for accuracy and/or corrections if applicable?

I respond, with what I hope is the end of this debate:
I love those questions even if I find parts of them a little on the loaded side. More on that later.

The Internet, or anywhere else for that matter, always can differentiate between media, between context and between statements based on how the maker chooses to qualify them. In the case of Mr. Heimoff, he has established a clear distinction between the two. He has stated it. He has repeated it. He means it. We understand it.
One of the problems with this question is that it presupposes more than it says. Even though you have asked a general question, this whole discussion revolves around that which Mr. Heimoff chooses to say here versus what he says in his day job. I suspect that he would not ever comment on politics in his Wine Enthusiast columns. And I suspect that he would be called out, called on the carpet and called a lot of names if he did.

I am going to interject my situation here by way of contrast. Although I do not generally engage in political commentary in my publication or in my blog, I also present myself to the world very differently. Tom Merle’s earlier assessment of my place in both print and blog spoke to the differences between Mr. Heimoff’s place here and my place in my blog.

In short, Mr. Heimoff proclaims that there exists a gulf between his day job and his blog. My day job and my blog are one and the same. One is simply an extension of the other.

Does the average reader know the difference, you ask. My answer is yes. The people who read Mr. Heimoff here understand that this is a non-paid, non-related position.

I guess the question I would ask of you is “objectivity” in what endeavor? Nothing that Mr. Heimoff writes here has the least bearing on how he reviews wine or how he sees trends in the wine industry. More than that, it seems to me to be a far stretch to suggest that anyone’s antipathy toward or embracement of the Tea Party movement one way or the other would or could affect the way they/we review wine.

I have said that I share much of Mr. Heimoff’s political beliefs. Yet, just because I choose not to comment on those beliefs (note that I did comment on HR 5034–and that is in the political arena) does not mean that my views on wine are more objective than anyone else’s. Objectivity comes from methodology and acceptance that truth is truth in our wine writing.

We all have a responsibility to tell it as we see it. And we have an equal responsiblity to see “it” objectively when it comes to our professional opinions. Mr. Heimoff’s political and social belief system is personal, not professional. So is mine and so is yours–unless you make your living not in wine but in politics.
I appreciate the kind words with which you started your entry above. But, as I hope you have now gathered, I have a hard time seeing the connections which your questions imply.

Sunday Serendipity
VINO ARGENTINO:
Laura Catena’s Love Letter To The Wines of Her Country

Sun, 19 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Reviewed by Stephen Eliot

One of the hot vinous topics over the last several years has been the emergence of Argentina as a source of world-class wines and of the country’s uncanny success with Malbec. That Argentina’s wines are good and getting better is a notion beyond debate, but there has not been a good source of current information about the contemporary Argentine scene. That very real need has recently been at least in part filled with the release of Laura Catena’s new book, VINO ARGENTINO: An Insider’s Guide to Wines and Wine country of Argentina, Chronicle Books, San Francisco, $27.50.

In part a primer of Argentina’s wine history and an introduction to the contributions of its influential winemakers, from her father to international consultants such as Michel Rolland and Paul Hobbs, the book also explores the culture and lifestyle of twenty-first century Argentina. It takes the reader on a province-by-province and who-is-who journey through the country’s important wine regions, and, as a bonus, it includes chapters on touring and foods with a collection of recipes tossed in for good measure. Ms. Catena speaks with a very personal and at times passionate voice and her unvarnished opinions are plain, as in her heart-felt defense of to her mind the unjustly vilified Michel Rolland. If we had our wish, the book would include more and far better maps for reference, but, if no scholarly text, the book is just what it claims to be, a very personal, insider’s guide written from the perspective of one who knows just whereof she speaks. And like virtually every book from this publisher, it is rich in photography (this time by Sara Remington) that brings the subject to you.

The daughter of Nicolas Catena, Argentina’s principal architect of Argentina’s wine revolution who was named by Decanter Magazine as their 2009 “Man of the Year”, Ms. Catena literally grew up in the business. She now divides her time between San Francisco where she is a practicing emergency-room physician and her Argentine home of Mendoza where she is owner and winemaker of Luca Winery and president of Botega Catena Zapata, the family’s iconic estate. Her book may not be the definitive work that Argentine wines ultimately deserve, but it is a useful, up-to-date volume that fills a significant niche that needs filling, and it earns thumbs-up endorsement.

Satisfying Saturdays
Angelo's Wine Country Deli

Sat, 18 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

87 ANGELO’S WINE COUNTRY DELI 23400 Arnold Drive CA121, Sonoma, CA 95476 GOOD VALUE

707-938-3688
www.angelossmokehouse.com

By Stephen Eliot

I first discovered Angelo's Wine Country Deli nearly twenty years ago, in my early days as wine instructor for the San Francisco's California Culinary Academy. I would periodically take busloads of my student chefs off for a day in the wine country, and a good many of these outings were hosted by the Carneros Quality Alliance which would conduct in-depth vineyard seminars and winery visits for my students. On one of our initial visits, the director of the CQA said that they would provide lunch and we were to drop by Angelo's and pick up said lunch on our way, and thus began a decades-long love affair with the place. The unassuming Angelo's is located on California Highway 121 just south of the town of Sonoma and right across the street from the sparkling wine cellars of Gloria Ferrer.

It would easy to miss but for the large plastic cow sitting atop its roof, but this a stop well worth making. Angelo is the self-styled “smoke king” of Sonoma, and his generous smoked- turkey sandwiches slathered with proprietary garlicky mustard remain one of the best quick wine-country lunches around. Beyond the usual deli fare of sandwiches and salads, all of which get enthusiastic thumbs-up endorsement, the real stars of the place are Angelo’s house-made sausages and what has got to be the finest beef jerky we have ever tasted. On any given day, you can find up to 18 different sausages, all of which are laced with plenty of garlic. The Smoked Linguisa and Smoked Hot Itailan are special favorites, and the Smoked Portuguese Hawaiian is not to be missed. There are 8 varieties of beef jerky on the list, and Angelo is particularly proud of the “VIP” recipe. Further specialities include sauces and salsas and a marvelous BBQ rub, all made by Angelo and only available here. The place is as informal as informal gets with a couple of picnic tables located outside the front door should you want to eat there. Whether hungry or not, we find time to drop by whenever we are in the neighborhood, and inevitably head home with bags of sausages, sauces, jerky and smoked meats to tide us over until our return.

WINE OF THE DAY

It is an odd twist that the most priceworthy of the so-called “aromatic” white wines is Riesling, when, for our money, it is also the most interesting of those grapes (think also of Chenin Blanc, Gewürztraminer and Pinot Gris among current U. S. grown wines and also of Albarino, Arneis, Torrontes and Tocai Friulano/Sauvignon Vert among varieties less often seen here). Riesling comes with the fragrances of flowers and white peaches and when well-made, has bristling acidity, often offset by moderate to boldly evident amounts of residual sugar. But like Champages and good sparkling wines, when that acidity and sweetness are blended harmoniously, the wine is in good balance and can be very likeable. In our recent look at Rieslings from across the United States, including lots from the Northwest as well as wines from Michigan’s Old Mission Peninsula and New York’s Finger Lakes region, the absolute standouts for value among a long list of values were the siblings that follow. Either vintage will suit just fine, and we often find the wines discounted locally nearer to $6.00 than to their listed retail price.

88 COLUMBIA CREST Two Vines Riesling Washington State 2009 $8.00
It is said that good things come in threes, and for the third year in a row, Columbia Crest's "Two Vine" Riesling delivers lots of bright and buoyant fruit with near-perfect balance between its medium sugars and cleansing acidity. That it does so at an out-and-out bargain price makes this good thing even better, and, it is certain to stay fresh and alive for two or three years. GOOD VALUE

88 COLUMBIA CREST Two Vines Riesling Washington State 2008 $8.00
The last vintage of Two Vines Riesling was one of the year's big surprises, and Columbia Crest has hit the mark for both quality and outstanding value once again. A fresh and buoyant wine of evident sweetness, it is far more about bright, Riesling-like fruit than it is about sugar, and, as easy as it is to taste now, it is so nicely constructed that it will keep well for several years should you elect to buy it by the case. GOOD VALUE

Friday Fishwrap: Random Jottings at Week's End
Where The Vines Meet The Bay: Gloria Ferrer
~~It’s a little slice of heaven

Fri, 17 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

You will soon discover, if you have not already, that there is a common theme running through our choices of wine country visits. We don’t ask much. We only want the wine to be good, the place to be easy on the eyes and the reception from the winery to be comfortable. Oh, and it would not hurt if the winery were tops in all three of those categories.

Picture this. You are sitting on your deck looking out over rolling hills, vineyards, soaring raptors riding the breeze, ancient biplanes flitting by, a view of the Bay in the distance and along comes your butler with a glass of perfectly chilled sparkling wine in his hand. Is that not a little bit of heaven? Well, it can be all yours when you visit the Gloria Ferrer winery south of Sonoma town. It is a favorite Saturday afternoon stop of ours on wine country drives, and it serves, for us, as the entry point for a day spent in and around Sonoma itself. Tours are available at mid-day and include tastes of the bubbly, or you can just sit out on the deck, under one of the expansive umbrellas and sip sparkling wine at nominal cost. But, do remember this. Gloria Ferrer is just the first stop, and as much fun as you as having in this little slice of heaven, there is a lot more to see in the area.

We will have much more to say about the Sonoma town area in coming blog entries. Tomorrow, for example, we will tell you why you need to stop at a ramshackle store and pick up the surprisingly good homemade victuals available there. On other days, we will offer insights to other wineries and to the several very special restaurants in Sonoma ranging from beer gardens to long-time favorites like The Girl and The Fig. But, first you have to get there, and Gloria Ferrer, with its spectacular hillside-setting and its delicious bubbly is very often our first stop.

Gloria Ferrer Winery
23555 Carneros Highway (Hwy 121)
Sonoma, California 95476
www.gloriaferrer.com
Click to show in Google Maps

Note: The address is often referred to as Arnold Drive on Internet Map Services and on some GPS units, including ours:
23555 Carneros Hwy. 121 (also called Arnold Drive- if you are using a GPS to find us be sure to enter Arnold Drive) in Sonoma, California

WINE NEWS OF THE DAY

JIM SUCKLING SURFACES

This inspired by the Decanter Magazine Breaking News feature:

A few months ago, the Wine Spectator’s chief European writer, Jim Suckling, suddenly disappeared from those sanctified premises, only to pop up on the Internet everywhere and anywhere. “What is Jim Suckling up to?” asked one email I received from a usually knowledgeable insider. Well, now the cat is out of the bag. Mr. Suckling, who once played on the SF winewriters softball team (a story for another day, that), has apparently been making wine and videos out of sight of us all. Follow the link to Decanter to see how Suckling is making wine sponsored by some rich ecumenical organization out of London and will have his wines from five countries served to the Pope in the coming days. And as if making wine for the Pope were not enough, apparently Mr. Suckling has been amassing video interviews of important wine people. Look for www.jamessuckling.com to debut next month.

Our Comment: We usually comment on our News of The Day items, but it is hard to top having your wine debut in front of the Pope. We can’t top that and we imagine that Jim Suckling will be hardpressed to outdo himself any time soon.

Thursday Thorns: The Report Card
Two Goodies: HR 5034 and Dan Berger

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

HR 5034

This legislation, being pushed in the Congress of the United States by a bunch of self-serving politicians whose contributions from alcohol wholesalers has them bought and paid for, has recently gone from bad to worse. In the face of Supreme Court rulings that have overturned local legislation favoring in-state interests at the expense of producers from out of state, has now been rewritten to make it the law of the land that such discrimination can now be practiced. What all this means as a practical matter is that states will be allowed to make laws that prevent out-of-state wineries and wine stores from shipping wine into any state that declares that their discriminatory laws advance any conceivable local purpose that cannot be adequately served by reasonable non-discriminatory alternatives. In other words, the states would be free to make laws that discriminate not only against out-of-state sources but also against their own citizens in favor of the big liquor and wine wholesalers.

Connoisseurs’ Guide tends to stay away from politics. We are in the wine commentary business, but we came into this business as consumers, our wine cellars are stocked with selections that we are able to buy wherever we can find them because California does not discriminate. Even in a state in which wine is big business, there is no hint of discrimination against outside retailers who undercut the locals, undercut the tasting rooms, pay no sales tax on California wine bought by Californians. Yet, the Congress, in its wisdom, has before it legislation which, if enacted in ways that prevent California producers and retailers from selling beyond our borders, could lead to a trade war of sorts as California moves to shut out other States from selling into California. Today, it is wine. How about whiskey? We make whiskey here. It is not as famous as that which comes from other places. Why not shut that other stuff out? How about baby food? Soap? Beer? Computers? How many jobs have we lost to Texas and Taiwan?

OK, we exaggerate. But the point is that any laws that discriminate against legitimate commerce ultimately discriminate against consumers. And, dear readers, that is where you come in. Have a look at the very good blog written by Tom Wark called Fermentation. In today’s offering, he gives the details and the arguments as only he can because he has been the absolute leader among wine scribes in this fight. Have a look at http://fermentation.typepad.com/fermentation/.

We rate his blog on this topic at: A
We rate the legislation and those who support it as: D

My Running Argument With Dan Berger

I like to kid my friend Dan because there is no more opinionated, outspoken, sharp-witted voice in the wine journosphere than Dan. No one takes themselves more seriously. No one tells you what is right and what it wrong more often and more self-convincedly than Dan. And no one is more in need of being kidded than my friend Dan.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Dan is a smart guy and he is right more often than he is wrong, but I will fairly frequently disagree with Dan because when he is wrong, he is wrong—in my opinion of course just he will believe that I am wrong. We have our disagreements, and have had them stretching back now for a couple of decades, but those disagreements, even in their vehement best never end in hurt feelings. Dan may be convinced of his positions, but deep down, he knows that his positions, his opinions are his own and not everyone else’s. That does not stop Dan from also knowing that he is right. And from me knowing that he is wrong. Thus, My Running Argument With Dan Berger—which will appear here in The Report Card from time to time because I just can’t help myself.

You might now ask yourself, as I did today, “what has Dan done now?” And I can answer that question. He has tackled the nasty question: what is complexity, and as my political science professor once described a local politician, Dan has come down squarely on both sides of the issue. I cannot tell you how stunned I am at this turn of events. Where is the bombast? Where are the right answers? Is this the same guy who recently described Napa Valley Cabernets as having become “parodies of themselves?” Dan, where have you gone. On this topic, even though he is trying to sound even-handed, he has given us pablum when we want Tabasco sauce.

Our grade: B-, for trying not to fry everyone else’s opinions.

He does go on to ask the question, “Where is Grenache?” OK, good question, that. We agree. What California needs is a lot of efforts with Grenache because the grape has the ability to show a personality that is totally its own. It is distinct, pleasant, inviting when done right. We need more Grenache. Good on ya, Dan, for asking the question. We might have been a little more convinced if your proof of Grenache’s goodness had not been rooted in comments you and others made ten years ago. Still, my good friend Dan, who has led the way in promoting Riesling, a cause in which we join him, needs to do more on behalf of Grenache than to repeat a decade-old story that he has told before.

Our Grade: A-/B+, for hitting the nail on the head, but less than top marks for hitting it with remarks that are essentially throwaways.

This was not Dan at his best, but it was also not Dan at his worst. I suspect the next installment of My Running Argument With Dan Berger will be edgier and funnier. I just love to kid Dan.

Wine And Food Wednesday
The Perfect Bottle of Wine

Wed, 15 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

100-Point Wine? The Perfect Bottle of Wine? Elixir of the Gods? So wonderful, it brought tears to my eyes as I tasted it? Caused me to praise Bacchus for allowing me to occupy the same space as “The Perfect Bottle of Wine”? Not in my portfolio, thanks. Wine is wine, and the fact that some wines thrill me or you more than others is what CGCW is all about, but it is not what life is all about.

Yet, just last night, I encountered one of those bottles that makes wine appreciation such a rewarding enterprise. I can’t say the wine was perfect. My dear wife told me so, although she later recanted when our meal arrived and the dish smoothed out the little bit of bite in the finish and brought out the remaining fruit, richness and all the layering and complexity that had developed in the bottle.

The wine in question was 1975 Heitz Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon served aged in magnum. Connoisseurs’ Guide rated this wine at back in the day, and accordingly, I purchased several bottles. But only one magnum. I think there are couple of bottles left—not sure because I don’t keep a running inventory of my cellar (a mistake to which I reluctantly admit), but there were eight of us at dinner last night for a friend’s round number birthday and, there, in the middle of the magnum section, of which there are only about ten wines so it was not hard to find, sat the Martha’s 1975.

Now, normally, I take a backup bottle to any event like this. The late Louis M. Martini told us in the first interview we ever did for CGCW in response to an inquiry about older wines, “There are not great older wines, just great corks”. But, as we were in a hurry leaving the house—things being a bit hectic these days what with the new website and its idiosyncrasies and my new book about to hit the book stores— I had no such backup plan and went with fingers crossed. Well, the first signs were not good. I keep my wines stored on their sides, and as older wines need decanting, I simply bring them to the restaurant with the bottle held in the same relative position. Sediment of that age does not wander around the bottle all that easily so a short ride in the car with the wine entrusted to the trustworthy Mrs. Olken is not likely to cause problems.

I handed the bottle to the staff with what I thought were clear instructions—keep it on its side with the the label lying to the left and then decant it off the sediment just before serving. No great airing needed at that age. The wine would get all the air it need in the decanting and the pouring into glasses process. Our group settled in the lounge for quick cocktail (yes, Virginia, a cocktail and not my usual bottle of bubbles). Eventually, the sommelier sidled up with my bottle in hand, still on its side, but with the label to the right. Somehow, in the process of passing it from one staff member to another, they turned it over. OK, a few unkind eyebrows were raised, but we agreed to set the bottle upright for the hour until we got to it with dinner, and to everyone’s relief, it has not been shaken up beyond repair.

The proof, however, is never in the handling, or even the cork which turned out to be pristine with hardly any color beyond the first half inch. This indeed was a great cork. No the proof is in the tasting, and with the first nosing, it was clear that the wine had survived. But, it was, as my dear wife so politely

pointed out, still a bit tannic in the finish. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that jug wine would have tasted tannic after her Martini and my Rye Manhattan.

The punch line to this story did not arrive until the dinner was on the table. We were eating at The House of Prime Rib in San Francisco. And as the name might imply, there is only one item on the menu. Yes, you can get five different possibilities from decadently thick to several thin slices to a couple of sizes in between and also the bottom end cut, which is the most tasty of all but is also going to be fairly well done. Prime Rib is one of those cuts of meat, like filet mignon, that has the most wonderful texture to go along with its innate richness. And, to me, that combination of flavor, texture and richness calls for an aged, supple, deeply flavorful wine with enough underlying tannin and acid to cut the richness in the finish of the food. To say that we had a 100-point combination would be too much. I don’t say those things. I will simply say that a well-kept magnum of Heitz 1975 Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet makes a most delightful accompaniment to a well-prepared, medium-rare slice of prime rib.

WINE NEWS OF THE DAY

It must be all this talk of cocktails that has made the following into our Wine News of The Day.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer offers the following news not to missed:

“Alaska just keeps on giving. First, there was Sarah Palin. Now, there's this.

Smoked salmon-flavored vodka will be sold in Washington liquor stores soon, courtesy of Palmer-based Alaska Distillery. "We know how it sounds, but the moment you try it, you'll never want another bloody Mary without it," said distillery founder Toby Foster.

The vodka is said to have a "smoky" taste. (I'm guessing that reads better than "fishy" on a label.) It's made by removing the skins of smoked salmon and grinding up the meat. Washington is the first state besides Alaska to sell the vodka, but these states have placed orders: Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, and Tennessee.

So, how did the guys at Alaska Distillery get the idea to flavor vodka with salmon?

"I think there was some madness and some drunkenness involved, honestly," Foster told the Associated Press earlier this year”.

Our comment: Yes, probably some madness and then some drunkenness and not necessarily in that order.

Tuesday Tributes: Best of the Blogs
The New Number One: STEVE! Heimoff

Tue, 14 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

By Charles Olken

I discovered blogging somewhat belatedly—about a year and half ago when I made the mistake of pooh-poohing new media while attending a wine luncheon in San Francisco. I was seated next to Steve Heimoff, my writing peer who covers California wine for The Wine Enthusiast, and there were a bunch of “youngsters” across the table discussing things new to me like Twitter, FaceBook and blogging. You understand how it is. I am “print journalist”, a member of traditional media, a dinosaur, a relic, a leftover from the days when people actually read newspapers that they held in their hands, wrote letters and communicated by telephones attached to wires.

Yes, I am that guy and blogging was unheard of. Never mind that Alder Yarrow, for example, had already been publishing his seminal blog, Vinography (http://www.vinography.com/) for four years, going on five, by that time or that some 1,000 separate blogs had found their ways onto the Internet. I was blissfully unaware of blogs and the rest of the so-called “social media”. That luncheon with Piero Antinori—the incredibly important Italian (think Tuscany’s Villa Antinori with its six hundred years of family ownership) who had been expanding into the new world with holding up on Atlas Peak in the Napa Valley, with Col Solare in the Columbia Valley and recently with the purchase of Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars from founder Warren Winiarski—I had been rather rudely awakened from my apparent somnambulist state of blissful ignorance and directed by Steve Heimoff and others to join the 21st Century. And now it has come to this. Thanks, Steve.

BEST OF THE BLOGS is happy, indeed delighted to salute Steve Heimoff, because of this one little note appended to his blog of yesterday (and more on that full blog in a moment): “Check it out: as of this morning, steveheimoff.com is the #1 wine blog in America! Of course, the rankings change every day, but I can be happy today”.

It is a much deserved honor to have risen to the top, and it was earned the old-fashioned way. Good, thoughtful writing, an accessible style and flashes of humor have brought Steve to this day.

As for the rest of what he wrote yesterday, modesty forbids me from posting it all here. But the a couple of interesting paragraphs have been pinned in below, and there is a link to the rest of it. If you are not yet a fan of Blog No. 1, now would be a good time to find out what all the fuss is about.

From Steve Heimoff, September 13, 2010.

A Shoutout to Charlie Olken

“One of the most influential books in my wine education was The Connoisseurs’ Handbook of California Wines, whose first edition was in 1980. The little handbook, which would fit in the back pocket of your jeans, was my constant companion, as I jaunted around San Francisco visiting fine wine shops”.

And then this. “Well, Charlie has now tried to learn a new trick, and has succeeded. You can check out his new blog, which he launched last week. (The blog is free; you have to pay to access the online CGCW newsletter.) I predict Charlie’s new blog is heading straight to the top of the English language wine blog pantheon. Certainly, it will be required daily reading for the industry”.

There is a lot more on Steve’s site at: www.steveheimoff.com. I heartily commend the site to you, not because he has honored CGCW with a mention of our new efforts, but because he is deservedly now the “numero uno” blogger in these parts.

Connoisseurs' Guide to California Wine

Tuesday TributesChenin Blanc vs Riesling—And Other Random Thoughts

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapSanta Rita Hills Pinot Noir: “More Is More” or “Less Is More”. A Debate.

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsHow I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Blog

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday Warblings“You Taste Through Your Toes”

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesSalmon: A Fish for All Wines

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapRead On For Chardonnays That Please The Palate and The Wallet

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsIt Is Time for Wine Lists to Serve Me—Not the Sommelier’s Ego

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsCostco: Not Wine For Dummies

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosTasting Chenin Blanc In Its Natural State

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapSave Your Money—No Wine Is Worth More Than $25

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsWashington State Flexes Its Vinous Muscles-- and Strains a Few in Reaching to Pat Itself on the Back.

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesGreetings from Gate A-22

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosA Green Blog—No Tree Harmed

Meet the New CGCW

Friday A Day In The Bizarre Life Of A Wine Critic -->

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesAnd Now—Some Good News About Alcohol and Politics

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsPick Your Poison Carefully—Lest It Pick You

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapIt’s Your Lucky Day: We Discover Great Gin For Winelovers

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsWhy Is Coppola Picking On The Little Guys? Subtitle: What’s In A Table?

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsHigh Alcohol Wines: Identifying The Culprit

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosTravels With Charlie

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapWho Said There Is No Humor In Wine Country

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsClass Warfare In The Wine Conversation

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesPredictions For A Tumultuous Year Ahead

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapDo Your Wallet A Favor: Try These Good Values This Weekend

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsThis Was The Week That Was

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsThe Disaster In Wine Lists—Out With The Tried and True; In With The Obscure

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosHow Mendocino County Can Get Ahead

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapTrouble in Paradise? A Quiet Reminder That More is not Always Better

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsA Wine Drinking Nation Declares War On Women

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsCritics vs. Sommeliers—The War Comes Out into the Open

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesIn The Vinous Twilight Zone, The 2011 Wines Have Become Superstars

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosNot So Guilty Pleasures Of Full-Flavored California Cabernet

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsCritics Cannot Sit On The Fence And Still Be Relevant

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesWho Is Relevant In 2012?

Meet the New CGCW

Monday ManifestosThrow Out Those Decanters

Meet the New CGCW

Friday FishwrapCODA: Biology, The Value of Wine Expertise and the Din of Barking Poodles

Meet the New CGCW

Thursday ThornsNot So Random Thoughts From A Random Mind

Meet the New CGCW

Wednesday WarblingsPseudo Science Hits The Wine World Again

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday TributesSuspending Rational Belief—19 Wines At 100 Points

Monday ManifestosThe Unnatural Stink Over Natural Wines

Meet the New CGCW

Tuesday Tributes
Chenin Blanc vs Riesling—And Other Random Thoughts

Friday Fishwrap
Santa Rita Hills Pinot Noir: “More Is More” or “Less Is More”. A Debate.

Thursday Thorns
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Blog

Wednesday Warblings
“You Taste Through Your Toes”

Tuesday Tributes
Salmon: A Fish for All Wines

Friday Fishwrap
Read On For Chardonnays That Please The Palate and The Wallet

Thursday Thorns
It Is Time for Wine Lists to Serve Me—Not the Sommelier’s Ego

Wednesday Warblings
Costco: Not Wine For Dummies

Monday Manifestos
Tasting Chenin Blanc In Its Natural State

Friday Fishwrap
Save Your Money—No Wine Is Worth More Than $25

Wednesday Warblings
Washington State Flexes Its Vinous Muscles--
and Strains a Few in Reaching to Pat Itself on the Back.

Tuesday Tributes
Greetings from Gate A-22

Monday Manifestos
A Green Blog—No Tree Harmed

Friday
A Day In The Bizarre Life Of A Wine Critic -->

Tuesday Tributes
And Now—Some Good News About Alcohol and Politics

Wednesday Warblings
Pick Your Poison Carefully—Lest It Pick You

Friday Fishwrap
It’s Your Lucky Day: We Discover Great Gin For Winelovers

Thursday Thorns
Why Is Coppola Picking On The Little Guys?
Subtitle: What’s In A Table?

Wednesday Warblings
High Alcohol Wines: Identifying The Culprit

Monday Manifestos
Travels With Charlie

Friday Fishwrap
Who Said There Is No Humor In Wine Country

Wednesday Warblings
Class Warfare In The Wine Conversation

Tuesday Tributes
Predictions For A Tumultuous Year Ahead

Friday Fishwrap
Do Your Wallet A Favor: Try These Good Values This Weekend

Thursday Thorns
This Was The Week That Was

Wednesday Warblings
The Disaster In Wine Lists—Out With The Tried and True; In With The Obscure

Monday Manifestos
How Mendocino County Can Get Ahead

Friday Fishwrap
Trouble in Paradise? A Quiet Reminder That More is not Always Better

Thursday Thorns
A Wine Drinking Nation Declares War On Women

Wednesday Warblings
Critics vs. Sommeliers—The War Comes Out into the Open

Tuesday Tributes
In The Vinous Twilight Zone, The 2011 Wines Have Become Superstars

Monday Manifestos
Not So Guilty Pleasures Of Full-Flavored California Cabernet

Thursday Thorns
Critics Cannot Sit On The Fence And Still Be Relevant

Tuesday Tributes
Who Is Relevant In 2012?

Monday Manifestos
Throw Out Those Decanters

Friday Fishwrap
CODA: Biology, The Value of Wine Expertise and the Din of Barking Poodles

Thursday Thorns
Not So Random Thoughts From A Random Mind

Wednesday Warblings
Pseudo Science Hits The Wine World Again

Tuesday Tributes
Suspending Rational Belief—19 Wines At 100 Points

Monday Manifestos
The Unnatural Stink Over Natural Wines

Thursday Thorns
Here They Go Again—Another Loony Study About Wine

Monday Manifestos
Let The Name-Dropping Begin—My Wine Gods of The 1970s

Friday Fishwrap
The Serious Side of The Prowein/Low Alcohol Lunacy

Tuesday Tributes
The Low Alcohol Craze Goes Overboard

Monday Manifestos
Waiting for Sauvignon Blanc

Thursday Thorns
You Say Older Wines Are Trouble—I Say “Poppycock”

Tuesday Tributes
A Love Letter To Syrah

Monday Manifestos
I Say 95 Points—You Say “Amen”

Tuesday Tributes
New Plantings—An Opinionated Analysis

Monday Manifestoes
The Horror of Terroir

Thursday Thorns
All The News That Fits We Spit

Monday Manifestos
It Hurts To Tell The Truth

Friday Fishwrap
Zinfandel Love Does Not Get Better Than This

Thursday Thorns
Celebrate Zinfandel Week With These Remarkable Best Buys

Tuesday Tributes
Zinfandel Stands Tall—Especially This Week

Monday Manifestos
There Is Always A Wine Angle

Thursday Thorns
Sommeliers Vs. Bloggers—The Battle To Replace Mr. Parker

Tuesday Tributes
In the News: Huh? Can You Say that Again?

Thursday Thorns
Stop The Music—I Can Name That Clone In Three Numbers

Wine and Food Wednesday
Good Food, Good Wine and “Pointless” Nights at the Table

Tuesday Tributes
I Despise The Hundred-Point System

Friday Fishwrap
Bourbon In Sonoma? The Grain and The Grape Have Hooked Up?

Thursday Thorns
A Brief Polemic About Natural Wine

Wine and Food Wednesday
In Which I Resolve, I Vow, To Never Eat Again

Tuesday Tributes
Guns or Wine: That Is The Question

Thursday Thorns
My Top Ten Wines of 2011

Wine and Food Wednesday
My Top Ten Wines of 2011

Friday Fishwrap
Holiday Thoughts and Wishes

Thursday Thorns
Criticizing Blake Gray

Wine and Food Wednesday
Fresh Dungeness Crab Is In—And So Is Sauvignon Blanc

Monday Manifestos
The Buck Stops Here—I Accept Full Responsibility For Ruining My Friends’ Palates

Thursday Thorns
Celebrating The Coombsville AVA

Wine and Food Wednesday
Have Some Madeira, My Dear

Tuesday Tributes
How To Judge A Wine Critic—Use The Caesar’s Wife Rule

Monday Manifestos
The Truth About The Wine News

Thursday Thorns
A Sad Week For Winewriting as Three Depart